A Very Muppets Mystery
by The Illustrious Crackpot
Summary: Phyllis Pepper is the only human in an all Muppet town. But will things spice up when Fozzie brings her a case that leads swiftly to Muppet homicide? An insanely long and ridiculously complicated mystery.
1. Chapter 1

**A Very Muppets Mystery**

(The Illustrious Crackpot)

**Dateline: The Box Seats  
From: The Hecklers**

**STATLER**: Hi, and welcome to A VERY MUPPETS MYSTERY!

**WALDORF**: I know you'd love to get rid of us, but I'm afraid you're stuck here.

**STATLER**: Why, I'll bet you're just GLUED TO YOUR SEATS!

. . . . . . . . .

**WALDORF**: That must be pretty powerful glue you used, Statler. They haven't gotten up.

**STATLER**: Well, this is a Muppets story you've never seen the likes of before.

**WALDORF**: ...And with luck, you'll never see the likes of again.

**STATLER**: It's a MYSTERY!

**WALDORF**: Well, I hope it's nothing like that awful THE GREAT MUPPET CAPER. We only showed up three times in the entire movie!

**STATLER**: There's only one thing I'm worried about...

**WALDORF**: What's that?

**STATLER**: Well, I...I've never heckled a MYSTERY before. I don't know how I should go about it!

**WALDORF**: What do you mean you've never heckled a mystery before? You always said it was a MYSTERY why anyone thought THE MUPPET SHOW was funny!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!

———

**Chapter 1**: The Client

Any private eye can tell you that the job ain't pretty. You'd need a seeing-eye dog or two if you thought that the detective business was the easiest sailing in the world. Phyllis Pepper's my name, and I know better than anyone else how hard the business could push you. A guy I knew, he wanted to become a detective though his parents expected him to be a doctor. He was never seen again.

He'd gone to art school.

I had entered the private detective business on a whim—it was that or college. Lots of people expect the affair to be glamorous, with loaded guns, beautiful women and, most of all, tons of drink. I don't pack a gun, and if you asked anyone about my looks they'd tell you I didn't pack much more than the nonexistent peashooter. I have less curves than a telephone pole, and I'm also a _lot_ less pretty. Any Bogart saving me from certain death would have a rude awakening the second he looked into my eyes. But thanks to "Draw Mickey Moose and Ronald Duck and get an Authentic Detective License", I went into business. Soberly, I might add. Never touch anything stronger than a triple-chocolate milkshake, unless it's a really wild occasion—that's when I go in for the Shirley Temple.

To tell the truth, I was never fascinated a bit by the movie detectives. So when I started up my agency, I threw out the complimentary offer of a fully-packed carbine (complete with six cartons of whiskey and a ravishing girl who just _happened_ to be in dreadful danger) and set up shop in a rented office. Soon it became apparent, however, that there were simply too many P.I.s in town for me to get more than one three-dollar case a week. So I moved, and set up shop in Muppetburg. But why did I, a natural, red-blooded human being, establish my enterprise as well as myself as the only things human in this entirely Muppet town? Maybe it's because I'm not prejudiced, maybe because I have an underlying Napoleon complex and need to make myself feel taller by being around Muppets? Maybe. But probably for the terrific rates.

See, Muppetburg is the only place in the entire _universe_ where all I just said about detective work isn't true. Nothing but _nothing_ happens here of momentous import, and the rates are _amazing!_ Other towns, you could get maybe one lost cat a week and earn five bucks for it. Ohhhh, not here. Three or more lost cats a week (sometimes even a cat who's lost their _owner_), coming in to a general grand total of twenty-five big ones. All that for a bunch of _cats!_ Yeah, the weeks get kinda slow sometimes when no one shows up, but when someone _does_ bring in a case—jackpot!

The client today was lucky number one in the middle of a week longer than a presidential speech. This one was a bear, with fur the exact right shade of lightish brown _nobody_ likes to see in their daily cup of coffee. He had on a felt-looking hat that would fit the shape of your head to the tiniest details but would fly away like _that_ in the slightest breeze. Plus, even for a Muppet bear, an ascot looking like a pair of cut-up spotted boxershorts shouldn't exactly be used in public unless you were searching for plenty of laughs. And this guy's appearance _without_ the tie was a practical barrel of monkeys. ...Well, no weirder than that "Uncle Deadly" guy from last week—but I shouldn't be comparing clients to my apartment's _landlord_.

The bear took off his hat and stood in front of my fancy oak-mahogany desk. I liked that desk; it was the only thing the evictioners had let me keep the last time they threw me out. I myself was seated in a chair the size of which could have fit a whole football team at_ once_. My client glanced around for something on which to sit his behind, but I was using the only chair available, so he just stood. If a client wasn't able to survive without a seat, they probably needed some kind of psychiatrist more than a private eye.

"Hey, um, are you Phyllis Pepper, the detective?" The bear had a voice you could pave a road with, if you didn't mind the funny bumps and detours along the way.

"That's what it says on the door," I replied, looking through my papers with a sort of indifference I liked to use to see how the client would react. ...It's like the chair thing, but a lot more fun.

He turned his head to make sure, then turned back. "Yeah yeah yeah, I know that. But are you her?"

Impatience to get himself heard, though cautious of upsetting someone, as well as perhaps a bit of imbecilism—though every Muppet had a little of the latter. I made a tick on a handy notepad, but in such a way that the bear's attention wasn't attracted to the fact that I was taking notes. "Yeah," I replied slowly, cagily. "I thought the trenchcoat was a dead giveaway. And what about you?"

Hurriedly replacing his hat, he began, "Well, Miss Pepper, I—"

"No need to tell me," I interrupted, leaning forward. "I know all about you."

He seemed somewhat taken aback. "Huh?"

With infinite confidence (and maybe some smugness) I launched into the tale. "You're Mike Oznowicz, a carpenter from New Orleans. You were married once to a fan dancer from the Lonely Hearts breakfast bar, but she left you for life with a chartered accountant. Your only daughter ran away from home seven years ago, and unbeknownst to you invested all her savings in the Mars Rover, only to go bankrupt and become a nun for the San Franciscan Catholic Church. You yourself, in need of some kind of guidance, became a movie producer and adopted the false last name Goelz. Your boss fired you and stole your dog, therefore repossessing everything you once owned. And now you're involved in a passionately romantic love affair with the detergent lady at the laundromat, who you just found out is the best girl of a biker gang leader. So you need my help to find out some dirt on your biker rival to get him out of the picture so you can pitch some woo with the gal of your dreams." I settled back in my chair, satisfied. "So, where should I start?"

"My name's not Mike Oznowicz." He was looking at me a little peculiarly, but mostly just seemed sort of confused.

"Oh." There was really no reply for _that_. Scooter the shoeshine boy gave you detailed, accurate information that was (best of all) cheap, but if I couldn't match a name to a face I could probably count those two bits wasted. But Scooter probably charged more for eight-by-ten autographed glossies.

Using an old detective trick, I swiveled my chair around so that he stared at the red canvas back and not my equally red face. He defied the intent of the maneuver, though, by plodding around the desk and right back in front of me. "Please, Miss Pepper," he said, "my name's Fozzie Bear, and I have a problem. You see, I have an act at this nightclub." Fozzie paused to smooth down the fur on either side of his face. "Yeah, that's me, _Fozzie_."

He looked up at me expectantly, but like a complete idiot I couldn't tell for what. Then I realized what it was he was waiting for, and I replied perhaps a little guiltily but with the most extreme of delayed reactions. "Oh yeah, I've..." I scrambled for a story. I couldn't tell him that I've never heard his name in my life, because that might ruin the dealings with him, and I _needed_ a case. "Uh...which nightclub, Mr. Bear? I've been to...quite a few in my time..." A lie.

"It's called 'Mahna Mahna'," Fozzie answered. "Actually, its name is 'Uncle Henson's Theater', but we all call it Mahna Mahna because that's the most famous act."

I'd never ever even _heard_ of Uncle Henson's Theater, but Fozzie was looking at me so expectantly that I had to answer. "Well, I...I must have missed your act, then," I answered precariously. His face fell, and I knew I had to do something quick. "B-but a friend told me about you, and he said you did brilliantly. Quite tear-jerking, actually. It was very emotional for him."

He stood there blinking for another moment. "Miss Pepper, I'm a _comedian_."

Whoops. "Ah, well, that is—" I thought like lightning, "Um, it's just that his—his mother was a stand-up too, and, uhhh, she was hit by this rubber chicken and, eh, died just before she could perform the best routine in her career, so—yeah. But after he got over the emotional part he thought you were very entertaining."

"OH!" The last time I'd seen someone this ashamed and wildly repentant he was trying to apologize to a herd of cows for ordering a hamburger instead of a garden salad. "Oh, I'm so _sorry_," Fozzie flustered, waving his hat in the air and covering his eyes. "I didn't mean—oh Miss Pepper, I—"

"How about just Phyllis?" I suggested quickly, putting up a roadblock before his speeding car of thought inspired self-guilt in me for making up such a phony story. "And I'll call you Fozzie if you don't mind, Mr. Bear. It makes things a bit easier."

The prospect of gaining first-name terms was a source of more pride for the bear than a child's first words for a couple of parents, and it thankfully got him off the topic of rubber-chicken-caused death. "All right, Phyll-IS!" he cried. Then he faltered. "Now, uh, where was I?"

It looked like it was going to be one of the proverbial "one of those days". "How about telling me your case, _Fozzie_."

"Oh yeah, right." Fozzie took his hat off again, then put it back on. I realized that he was doing this quite a lot. He cleared his throat. "Eh-heh-heh-hem. Anyways, my boss at the club, Sam, has this thing that's going on, you see." He paused.

I resisted the temptation to roll my eyes. You pick that knack up easily in this town. "No, actually I don't see."

"Oh." He seemed disappointed. "I just thought if I knew, _everybody_ must know." Fozzie cleared his throat again. "Anyways, Sam (my boss you know) has been acting kinda weird, the past few weeks. And he's been treating this one act with more, _appreciation_ than all the others, even than mine. Now," he rushed on, "I'm not going to say that someone else shouldn't take the spotlight, because I know, see, I _know_ that all the most famous TV acts started as unnoticed little sideshows in clubs and that sort of stuff."

"Uh-HUH." Could anyone take much longer to get to the point?

"Well," he continued, "my agent, Irving Bizarre, says something's going on, and I think he's right. See, Sam is usually this fair kind of guy, I mean he doesn't like _any_ of our acts or anything, but he still plays them all. But then all of a sudden these two guys, actually a guy and a girl, Wayne and Wanda, show up out of _nowhere_ and now they're getting all the breaks from him! See, he puts them on three times a night and gives them all sorts of amazing reviews and doesn't act like he notices that we, the rest of his"—he paused for emphasis—"_loyal_ performers, are getting paid _less_ and _less_." Fozzie pantomimed his rates with his hands. "Wayne and Wanda, on the _other_ hand—see, not this hand but the _other_ one—keep getting more money. And being put on stage more." Fozzie stopped there, hat in hands once more and seeming to expect me to know automatically what the case was supposed to be. I tried my best.

"So," I began, "Could this possibly be because Wayne and Wanda are a better act than the rest of you performers?"

The comment acted with the effect of a personal insult. "No, no _no_!" he insisted. "Wayne and Wanda are _horrible_, you hear that, they're _terrible!_ They're the Frank Sinatra of music! They're the Marx Brothers of Hollywood! They're the Jack Benny of radio!"

I felt an urge to put a checkmark in a box next to "never use for clarification". "Fozzie, sir—kid—bear—...Foz?" I began tentatively. "All the people you just listed were _really_ _successful_ in each of those fields."

"Oh." He paused to think about this new revelation. Then he looked up. "Then they're the...uh...the Brady Bunch of TV reunions?"

Close enough. "Are you sure this isn't just professional jealousy?" I queried.

"I'm not jealous!!" He was a very insistent character, too. "Those two are the _worst!_ I would be better than them with, with one hand tied behind my back!!" Fozzie then held one hand behind his back to demonstrate his point.

I sighed resignedly, then reached up and pulled down a sheet of paper from a high shelf behind my desk. "All right," I acquiesced, "I'll take your case, but first you have to fill this out."

Handing the sheet of paper to him across the desk, I surreptitiously slid half the other paperwork off my desk and into the wastebasket. I didn't really think that George, my janitor, would be interested in clearing my desk of the numerous bills himself. Fozzie took the paper and held it up at every angle. "What is _this?_" he asked.

I also whipped a pack of cigarettes off the desk and into a bottom drawer. I never used them and neither did my clients, but sometimes lighting them gave an impressive smoke-like effect in my harder dealings. ...Not that I _had_ larger dealings than all these cat cases (this Fozzie business was a first), but they were always just _there_ anyway. "It's a form, nothing legally binding, just saying that you _did_ ask me to take your case, as well as stuff like your phone number and where you live, and how I can expect you to pay me."

Out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw him flinch. "What's the matter, can't read?" I asked. Hey, it was always a possibility, even with _Sesame_ _Street_ dominating Muppetburg airwaves.

"No," he replied, then hurriedly changed his answer, "I mean, YES, I _can_ read, it's—" He shook his head and pulled out a ballpoint pen, scratching away.

I waited patiently while he filled it out, then checked the form over when he'd finished. He had bold handwriting, but a bit on the sloppy side. It reminded me a little of mine, sad to say. I did a swift reconnaissance of the information and found to my satisfaction that it seemed mostly accurate. I _had_ expected a guy like Fozzie to live somewhere in the rooms above his nightclub—comedians were notoriously poor—and the phone number checked out as well. His signature also appeared authentic, so I was happy enough. "Good," I replied, shelving the form, "Thank you for your business, Mr. Bear. I'll start as soon as possible." I began shuffling my in-office belongings around as I prepared to close up shop for the afternoon, but was interrupted by an outburst from Fozzie.

"Ah ah ah, hold it!" he cried out. I whirled around, expecting a gun of some sort at my shoulderblades, but found only the bear with his silly grin. "You call me _Fozzie_, _not_ 'Mr. Bear'."

Oh yes, how could I have been so _careless?_ "Well then, good day, _Fozzie_," I amended, trying very hard (but not succeeding) to not sound sarcastic. "I'm sure your case will be wrapped up before you know it." I wasn't actually planning on investigating the matter, as I was sure that it was only a case of professional rivalry, but I did find in Fozzie the qualities I needed in a client: a big-sounding, probably over-exaggerated case that I could charge to the fullest (within reason), and enough gullibility to most likely accept any story I gave him as an explanation—providing I didn't take it too far. Fozzie was still standing in my office, so I motioned for him to leave. "Now, please vacate the premises. I'm off to 'lunch'."

"Oh, right! Sorry," he apologized. He ambled out, giving only one backward glance. "Goodbye, Phyllis!"

When he was out of sight I allowed myself a grin, wrapping my trenchcoat even tighter around me. A case at last. The money wasn't exactly rolling in, but I was sure I'd soon be in it as far as I could go.

———

**WALDORF**: So, how do you like it so far, Statler?

**STATLER**: Well, that was a good beginning. I always love good beginnings!

**WALDORF**: I liked it too. It was wonderful!

**STATLER**: Bravo! Encore!

**WALDORF**: More!


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**: Kermit

**WALDORF**: OH NO, THEY HEARD US!

———

After locking up my office, I headed straight to my favorite diner: a little out-of-the-way place called Movin' Right Along. It was about as big as a business transaction between five-year-olds, but with furnishings more comfortable than most six-cents-a-week flats—and I knew this on a personal level. The lights could stand being fixed and the plumber could have done better when he'd irrigated this water from the Panama Canal, but the atmosphere was friendly as a warm cup of cocoa and I could always use the place as a rest spot between apartment evictions.

After exchanging "hellos" with a few of my more prominent fair-weather friends, I was about to go straight to the pay phones as usual when something new caught my attention. No, the stairs hadn't been polished (not since 1885), nor had the chandelier been replaced with anything more modern and tasteful. The barman was the same guy it had always been—I could recognize those three heads anywhere. Then what was it?

The sound of the song "Eight Little Notes" in near-masterful rendition, both pianically and vocally, wafted out of a corner of the room, and I smiled to myself. So they'd actually gotten a pianist. It was intriguing, hearing such a familiar Muppet song being sung in this generally unmusical location. Wending my way through the sparse crowd, I headed over to the new musician just as he finished belting out the final stanza.

He was a Muppet dog, with big round eyes and ears that lopped side-to-side when he ran his fingers across the keys. The jolting movement that accompanied the striking of each note bounced him more than that tornado had shaken up Dorothy. The dog's fur, too, was at the exact opposite end of brown than Fozzie's had been, all reddish-dark and even. As he finished the song with a final strike of a G, I pulled a wooden chair up to the piano by him. My action didn't go unnoticed by the musician, and the dog turned to face me with somewhere near a casual but worn-out air.

"Are you a music-lover or a tax collector to get me for noise pollution?" he asked, grinning widely. His voice was deep and rough, but affable like the rest of him seemed to be. I couldn't help but smile as I answered.

"Neither, but your rendition of that song was comparable to Beethoven himself."

Giving a barking laugh, he replied, "Why, because it was full of soul or because it should be dead and buried by now?"

I chuckled in response. The dog waved to a passing maitrê-dé. "Waiter!...Waiter! Can I have two triple-cream sodas over here?" he asked, holding up two fingers to the guy.

As the waiter nodded and started to scurry off, I called out to him, "Make that one triple-cream soda and a root beer float." After pausing to shrug, the waiter left again and I turned to my new companion. "Sorry, but I'm not a heavy drinker."

He sniggered. "Who said anything about one of those being for _you?_ I only ordered for myself!" Then with a sly glance, he added, "Besides, I don't drink with strangers."

A pause settled over the piano for a moment. Then he extended a paw. "I'm Rowlf."

With a grin I shook his hand. "Phyllis Pepper."

He scratched his head, studying me carefully. "Hey," he offered suddenly, "you're that human dame that just moved in last year, huh? You caused quite a riot in town with your decision to move here. Ol' prejudices flaring up and all."

I glowered at him a little, but he seemed to be taking it with enough stride. "Yeah." The waiter appeared with our drinks, and I plucked my root beer off the tray. "But I got here, and I've got a special permit and everything. But mostly everyone seems to have accepted my presence. No bricks through the windows, at least." The last sentence came out more bitterly than I would have liked.

"Hey, no offense meant," Rowlf said immediately, sounding concerned that I had thought that _he_ was one of those against me. "It's just, I remembered your name. Well, I _should_—no other humans have followed suit in your example."

I sighed. "Lucky me."

Having that accomplished, Rowlf turned to the piano and looked back up at me. "Want to hear a song I composed just last night? It's sure to be an ever-popular classic."

"Sure," I replied, taking a sip of my drink. I settled back in my chair as Rowlf strenuously picked out the opening notes. He turned back to me.

"It's called 'You and I and George'." A few more notes were urged out of the instrument. "My own mother turned down her hearing aid when I sang her this song." Clearing his throat, he started.

"_You_..._and_ _I_ _and_ _George_...  
_Went_ _strolling—through_ _the_ _park_ _one_ _day_.  
_And_ _then_..._you_ _held_ _my_ _hand_...  
_As_ _if_ _to_ _say_...'I love you'..._"_

Rowlf paused to run his paws up the keys again.

"_Then_..._we_ _passed_ _a_ _brook_...  
_And_ _George—fell_ _in_ _and_ _drowned_ _himself_.  
_And_ _floated_..._out_ _to_ _sea_...  
_Leaving_ _you_..._alo-ONE_...  
_With_...ME!!_"_

As the final chords were struck, Rowlf wiped sweat off his forehead, turning back to me. "Well? How did you like it?"

What are you _supposed_ to tell a guy like that? "Well..." I fumbled, "it was very..._imaginative_."

"Oh, you're just saying that," he insisted with ill-concealed pride. He quaffed his triple-cream in a single gulp, slamming his empty glass on top of the piano. Wiping his mouth with a paw, he started in on a daring attempt at the "Fur Elise". He stumbled many times, but didn't give up. I just listened for a while, then starting talking when I felt he deserved a break—or rather, that the poor "Fur Elise" deserved a break.

"How long have you been playing at this place?" I inquired, chugging my drink. "I've never seen you in here before."

Finally turning his back on the instrument, he looked me over again. "You've _been_ here before now?" he queried back, incredulous.

I couldn't hide a chuckle. "Perhaps a few times more than I would have liked. Why is it so unusual?"

Rowlf scratched his floppy ears and gestured at the trenchcoat. "Well, I'd think that a detective would be _above_ Movin' Right Along. Plus, folks don't take kindly to being interrogated in this here place."

Movie stereotypes strike again. "I don't exactly stick around asking people if they're involved in smuggling enterprises," I cut in. "Usually I just grab a soda or something—I know well enough not to actually _eat_ anything here."

Rowlf gave that barking laugh again. "You got me there," he sniggered. "Now for the other question, I just started here last evening. A struggling genius needs _some_ kind of recognition."

Did I know _that_ feeling sometimes...well, maybe sans the "genius" part. "So, how much you playing here for?" I asked, out of curiosity.

Averting your eyes when you're a Muppet is tantamount to blushing up to your ears when you're a human, and boy was this dog averting. "Um...about that..." he mumbled, "...I'm not getting paid."

That made me sit up and take notice. "What?"

Here was an oddity, even in a Muppet town: a dog with a sheepish look. "I asked the manager for a job, but he wouldn't pay me. So I'm just playing without wages." Rowlf grinned cunningly. "After all, the best acts were discovered as sideshows in bars and nightclubs, you know."

I studied him for a second, then asked, "You wouldn't happen to know a guy named Fozzie Bear, would you?"

He scratched his head. "I don't think so...why—"

"Never mind," I cut him off, "it was just a thought." I checked the clock. One-twenty on the dot, though with the rusty cogs of the old ticker you could never be sure whether its presented time was grammatically correct or not. Scholars have sat around debating just how off on the time the clock was, and one of them was even brilliant enough to have devised an impressive-looking mathematical formula to be used to calculate the real time from the clock. But I never was much of a whiz at algebra and, besides, the guy had neglected to let anyone else see his notes before he started a career in being a stunt double for Steve Urkel. Nevertheless, I'd figured that it was late enough to have to check in, so I pushed back my chair and stood up. "It was neat talking to you, Rowlf, but I've got to go. Thanks for the root beer."

"Welcome—it was on _you_ after all," he added mischievously, then laughed as he saw my expression. "Nah, just kidding. I'll pay it." My relief must have shown on my face, because Rowlf sniggered again. "I should've known trenchcoaters would be down on their luck. But it doesn't matter so much, 'cause I am too." I was about to leave, but he stopped me with a gesture. "When can I see you again?"

I shrugged indifferently, picking up my empty glass. "I'm here a lot. If you're playing this joint, chances are you'll run into me at some point or other." Then, on inspiration, "Why?"

He scratched himself behind the ears. "Everyone needs a music critic. 'Sides, I've wanted to be a detective myself since I read that Sherlock Holmes story."

"Oh, really?" I asked. "Which one?"

"_The_ _Hound_ _of_ _the_ _Baskervilles_."

I should have known. "Well, see you sometime, then, Rowlf. Keep up the composing."

As I walked off, the first bars from "Minuet in G"—or rather, _Rowlf's_ "Minuet in G"—mangled eardrums in the background.

* * *

In the back of the diner was a pay phone, which I made a beeline for. And for the record, I am _not_ one of those loiterers who stands in front of the phone for twenty minutes digging for spare change. Only a sucker actually puts _money_ into those things—I've learned from careful observation of others in the bar that if you touch the red wire to the little green voice chip and then give your wrist a simple _flick_ like so, you automatically get a free ten-minute call. Of course there's always the small chance of electrocuting your backside off, but hey, in this town it beats giving up the quarter.

———

**STATLER**: You SAID it!

_ZZZT._

**STATLER**: AAAAH!

**WALDORF**: Give me a quarter! Heh heh heh!

———

Waiting impatiently for a eight-foot-tall, brown-furred fuzzy guy with yellow eyes to finish talking to his mother, I finally let fly my technique and punched in the number: 555-8694. It rang, and rang, and rang, but at last somebody picked up. "HELLO?" It was a girl, with as screechy and nasal a voice as the sound of nails scraping down a blackboard. "THIS IS _The Muppetburg Times_ NEWSPAPER. WHAT DO YOU WANT?"

I clapped a hand over one ear to avoid the full blast of her voice. "It's me, Alice," I answered calmly. "Put me through."

"YOU WHO?"

Rolling my eyes, I gritted my teeth. "Phyllis Pepper. I've been calling regularly since and before you were employed as switchboard operator. You know who I am. Now put me through."

"TO WHOM?"

I wanted to scream. "We go through this EVERY TIME, Alice. You've been working as the receptionist for _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ for over _two_ _months_. I've been calling _the_ _same_ _person_ _every_ _day_. Now, WHO do you think I want to call?"

I could hear the gears clanking as she undertook the difficult task of thinking. "GEORGE BUSH?"

I lost it. "NO, FOR GOSH SAKES! WHO'D WANT TO CALL **HIM**? _JUST_ _PUT_ _ME_ _THROUGH_ _EXTENSION_ _EIGHT!!"_

"OK, YOU DON'T HAVE TO YELL ABOUT IT!" Alice shouted back, pushing the necessary buttons with enough force to tear them out of her console. I heard the dial tone, then two rings. _Please_ _let_ _him_ _be_ _in,_ _please_ _let_ _him_ _be_ _in_, I thought. I shouldn't even have had to worry about that, as his job never let him _out_. But still—

"Hi ho!" came a thin voice. "Kermit the Frog at _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_, how may I help you?"

Coughing just a bit, I put a false rough edge into my voice and started talking. "Hello? Yeah, this is The Pizza Twins. I'm here about the order placed last week, the one you said to deliver straight to the office instead of the home address?"

The timid, reedy voice on the other side of the line now became even more timid and reedy. "Um...what about it?" he asked anxiously.

"Well," I continued, grunting and pretending to shuffle around some papers, "We charged it to the separate home bill just like you asked, but the order bounced. You're going to have to reimburse us for the total amount of the order, the office pizza and the home pizzas. Sorry, kid, but that's just what we have to do."

"Rats." I could hear him groaning over the line. "Now I wish I hadn't ordered that extra pizza last week."

I dropped the charade instantly, almost shouting. Quite a few heads in my immediate vicinity turned and looked at me weirdly, but I ignored them. "_AHA!_ You DID order another pizza at the newspaper office and charge it to me!"

A note of dismay crept into the voice. "Oh no—it's _you_, isn't it?"

Home base wasn't too far away now. "HA! Thought you could slip one over on the ol' Pepper, huh?" I stated triumphantly. "Well, let me tell you, froggy boy, it didn't work! I heard the confession!"

His voice became mock-bitter, but I could tell that where he was, he was smiling. "Well then, Miss Detective, how did you find me out?" Kermit inquired in fake sarcasm. "I suppose the dancing rats slipped you some handy info. Or perhaps you noticed a faint _eau_ _de_ _frog_ on their receipt? No, wait, I got it: you traced the origins of the pizza company to an albino monk in Siberia, and you noticed my picture on his website."

I began to smile too. I could just see that theoretical picture now: Kermit with his spade-shaped head, eyes like ping pong balls, skin the color of—of—come on, there's nothing else in the _world_ that's that _green_. "Actually, it was more of the fact that there was an extra pizza listed on the receipt than what had showed up at the flat. And when I called up to say I shouldn't be charged for a pizza that not only did I not _receive_ but I hadn't _ordered_ in the first place, the boss said that someone had gotten a separate delivery and charged it to my next order because it was _proven_ that the one who'd ordered the _extra_ one lived at the flat _too_. And unless there's another _very_ _small_ boarder living in the walls that I don't know about, the mystery pizza must belong to _you_. Pay up."

A reluctant sigh fizzled through the pay phone's earpiece. "All right, how about this?" he proposed. "I'll order _you_ a pizza sometime, and then _I'll_ pay for it."

"Smart move," I teased. "You know I don't order the twenty-dollar toppings _you_ do. I mean, just so many 'fly-mosquito-cheeses' and it sort of starts to add up."

"I know you're joking," he replied, sounding almost indignant. "How long have we shared that apartment, eight months? I've kind of picked up on your personality by now."

"Oh good, then maybe you can tell me whether it's genetic deficiency or just plain madness that makes me act like this!" I shot back, chuckling.

Finally I heard him laugh, one of the sounds I always had to wait for but always ultimately paid off. But he soon got down to business. "Any cases yet? I can't pay the rent myself, much as I'd like to."

"You wouldn't," I insisted, "I'd force you to let me try to pay my honest half either way. But I actually _did_ get a client. Name of, what was it, Fozzie Bear. Problems with his boss at the nightclub he performs at. Probably willing to pay a reasonable sum for me to give him a reasonable explanation."

"Good," Kermit replied, then I heard a pause. "It's almost two-thirty. Are you going to start working on his case?"

"HECK no!" I answered carelessly. "I'm positive this whole thing is just professional jealousy. This bear's whole argument is that his boss is emphasizing this one couple as an act, even though they're allegedly 'the worst'. They're probably just these two actors the employer thinks has a lot of talent. I guess I'll just figure out a simple excuse and accept however much money he's willing to pay. That's the simplest way out."

There was a short silence, then out of the blue Kermit suddenly asked, "Which nightclub is it that this 'Fozzie' fellow performs at?"

I had to recollect my thoughts before I could reply. "Uncle Henson's Theater...he also said it's known to at least the performers as Mahna Mahna. Why do you ask?"

I could practically hear him averting his eyes even on the other side of the telephone line. "Well, it's just..." He swallowed. "...Since I'm getting off work at seven, I was wondering if we could maybe, you know, check it out. Just because, you know..."

I suddenly had a spot of trouble inhaling, but I was able to speak past it. "Sure. Maybe I can hear about these 'Wayne and Wanda' people, see why the bear's so jealous of them." The silence over the line soon grew awkward, so I said, "I'll hang out 'till your workday's over. Meet you at Shoeshine Scooter's. That OK?"

"...Sure."

I hung up with a smile. For once I had something more than TV dinner to look forward to this evening, and even on the pretense of work. How great is _that?_

As I turned to leave the pay phone, however, I crashed into someone—or some-_thing_—less than shoulder-high to me and knocked it over. Whoever or _whatever_, it was was lying flat on the floor now, and as I got a good look I couldn't imagine that it could actually be a _person_. I mean, even for a _Muppet_ he looked weird. Fur the color of smashed blueberries, wide eyes with a very lidded expression, and a nose you could hang _coats_ on...I could go on and on, but it wouldn't do justice to him. Nonetheless, I helped him up with several apologies and moved aside to let him to the pay phone. "Sorry, sorry, I wasn't looking where I was going. The phone's all yours."

He rubbed his skull. "Thanks," he replied in an almost nasal voice—reasonable, considering his _amazing_ nose. "Don't worry about me, I just landed on my head. That's the hardest part of me sometimes."

I couldn't tell whether or not he was joking, so I took it in stride instead. "Really."

"Oh yeah," he went on. "You know," the guy confided, as if it was forbidden knowledge, "when I get shot out of a cannon and land on my head, people cheer. And it doesn't even hurt!"

"Oh yes." I was getting impatient and kept making glances at an imaginary watch, but my new conversation partner didn't take the hint.

"You know," he went on, "Harry Houdini wasn't such a great guy. I mean, everyone keeps talking about him, but he wasn't so amazing. _He_ never got shot out of a cannon."

"Mm-_hm_..." I was getting my hackles up now.

"But soon everybody will know of _my_ genius," he continued. "All the best TV stars and movie stars had little sideshow acts that were noticed at _just_ the right time by people with lots of money. You see—"

At this point, not even making a crack about Fozzie this time, I just broke in and informed him hastily, "Sorry, it's very interesting, but I have to go," and left without another word. I had _better_ ways to kill time 'till seven without learning about the extensive history of human cannonballs.

———

**STATLER**: You know, one thing I don't understand about mysteries is that they throw in totally unrelated people who have no point whatsoever except maybe to get a cheap laugh, then all of a sudden they bring them back and expect us to remember them and their importance to the plot!

**WALDORF**: Uh-huh.

**STATLER**: And another thing I don't get is how a mystery can go underway for twenty pages without the actual MYSTERY appearing at all! All this "Phyllis Pepper" chick has done is take a stupid case from that unfunny bear, talk about pianos with the dog, make a date with the amphibian and learn about landing on your head from the...I guess he's a "whatever"...but all this stuff is just POINTLESS! It's like the author of this whole thing is writing this just for her own amusement.

**WALDORF**: Yup.

**STATLER**: Like all these in-jokes. I mean, who's going to catch the reference to the song "Movin' Right Along"? Or "Mahna Mahna". Or "Mike Oznowicz". Or "Uncle Henson's Theater". Or "Goelz", or "You and I and George", or especially "The Pizza Twins". I mean, the person who gets all this would have to be a total Muppet lover!

**WALDORF**: ...Statler?

**STATLER**: Yes?

**WALDORF**: YOU just got all that.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

**STATLER**: AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!

———

_A/N: The song "You and I and George", featured in this chapter, has no credited writers and initially appeared in _The Muppet Show_. The lyrics were obtained from _The Muppet Show_ Season 1 DVDs, disc 1._


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter ****3**: Uncle Henson's Theater

When seven-o'clock finally tolled, I was ready and waiting at Shoeshine Scooter's post. Scooter was a young, orange-skinned Whatnot with a head of stringy red hair and eyes that were constituted solely of a pair of glasses, and he was always eager to do business. My shoes having been immaculately cleaned earlier that morning, however, I passed the time by asking him about the deal on the eight-by-ten glossies. Then when that dried up and his customers started lining up to hear the day's news, I amused myself by kicking an empty can of beans across the alley and back. Then, when I was sick enough of Scooter's incessant motormouth to have considered buying a pair of earmuffs—Kermit showed up.

"Sorry I'm late," he apologized profusely, panting to try to catch his breath, "but I kinda forgot where Scooter's was. I couldn't remember if it was near Ernie's Rubber Duckie Outlet or if it was next to The Jerry Nelson Wall of Fame."

"Nah, s'okay," I replied, smiling a little. "He's always moving so the cops can't trace his location...'cus they don't even _pay_ him for the info." I paused. "Nice to see you didn't exactly dress up for the occasion. I woulda felt left out."

Kermit was wearing a gray hat with a little "press" sticker on the brim, complete with a trenchcoat just the smidgenest darker than mine. It was an interesting fit over his circular torso, and his legs stuck out like popsicle sticks underneath. He laughed uncertainly. "When you get unpaid overtime on a job you're not likely to be promoted in anyways, you forget about stuff like tuxedos and top hats, and 'steppin' out with a star'," Kermit sighed. He took a break to adjust his hat. "But then again, I shouldn't have to tell _you_ this."

I grinned. "Yeah. The last time _I_ wore a tux, I was telling a group of fellow students exactly why I was so happy that I'd graduated. But I'm afraid the teachers didn't exactly approve of the phrase 'all-you-can-read comic books' in a school speech."

Kermit shifted nervously from foot to foot, quite a feat when your limbs are thinner than a politician's promises. "Er...shall we go?" he put in hesitantly.

"All right," I replied, then before he could utter another syllable I took off down the street. "Last one there has to sing a _Wizard of Oz_ medley!" I called back at him.

"Not fair!" Kermit cried back, but then laughed and ran after me. "I'll make you do 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' yet!"

* * *

Uncle Henson's Theater was obviously a big, classy affair, because right outside was a neon sign proclaiming "UNCLE HENSON'S THEATER" in alternate blues with a light-up top hat and cane pointing to the entrance. It was even classier inside, with all the things Movin' Right Along _didn't_ have: almost-decent food, snazzily bright lights and even a working clock. Can you picture _that?_ And there was also this slot machine-looking thing in the corner that had _eyes_...it was labeled "Vend-a-face", and plenty of Muppets were doing just that. I wasn't really inclined to jump in line.

———

**STATLER**: Yeah. I tried that "Vend-a-face" once. It was a NIGHTMARE!

**WALDORF**: Wasn't that the thing that said it'd rearrange your looks, and then it punched you in the nose?

**STATLER**: That's the one...

**WALDORF**: It wasn't SO bad. You look BETTER beaten-up! HOHOHO!

_WHUMPH._

**STATLER**: So do you.

———

After we made it through the hat-check (albeit without actually _checking_ anything), Kermit escorted me to a table just a few seats away from the stage and the orchestral pit. The tables weren't exactly like what you'd find at the Ritz, but they were still pretty fancy—a tablecloth on each one and an entire table setting laid out for you. I was tempted to take a photo and show it to the manager of Movin' Right Along to show him what he was missing out on, but even if there had been a photographer conveniently standing there I'd have been too speechless to order a picture.

Just as Kermit and I sat down and ordered a few basic meal items, the lights dimmed and the orchestra cranked out a short tune. The boisterous noise quieted down to a murmur, then died away entirely as a spotlight opened on the stage. After a few more moments, a very large, stiff-looking eagle Muppet shuffled on stage. His feathers were a patched and faded blue, and he had a look on him that could only be classified as "disapproving". Smoothing back the sparse down around his head, he coughed and began in a clear, throaty voice, "I, Sam, the"—he paused to emphasize with a pose—"_American_ Eagle, hope that you all have had a most, _enjoyable_ evening." I swear I almost heard him mutter, "up 'till now". But maybe I just imagined it. He went on. "So, to insure that there is quality talent presented here, on this stage, tonight, may I open with the singing duet of Wayne and Wanda, and their rendition of 'Trees'."

There was scattered applause as the curtain opened to a young Muppet man and Muppet woman with a forest backdrop. Though the young man was slender and had a bit of a "Zeppo Marx" look about him, the woman was a bit large around the middle and had overly curly brown hair. They both had very human-looking eyes, and Wayne—obviously the man was Wayne, not Wanda—was wearing a grayish-brown suit coat with a bright orange hat. Wanda wore an extravagant green dress. Clearing his throat, Wayne started the song as the pit orchestra played behind.

"_I_ _think_ _that_ _I_ _shall_ _never_ _see-e-eeee_..  
_A_ _poem_ _lovely_ _as_ _a_ _treeeeeee_..._"_

He paused to inhale in preparation of his next line, but just as he was about to go on, the prop tree in the background suddenly tilted and crashed on top of both Wayne _and_ Wanda, bringing down most of the curtain with them. The orchestra was evidently used to this, as they all just rolled their eyes and stopped playing simultaneously. I myself was stunned. When Fozzie had pleaded his case to me in the morning, I'd suspected that he had been exaggerating about his rivals, as he'd exaggerated most everything else. But he hadn't. They were ten times _worse_ than he'd said. ...But I still didn't buy his story of something else going on to make his boss favor them. I mean, this was a _Muppet_ town! Muppetburg! No way that sort of thing happens outside human cities, much less human _movie_ _theaters!_

I forced myself to forget about it as the eagle shuffled back on stage, looking disappointed. "Well, then..." he sighed, "...that was Wayne and Wanda." He checked a notecard, his eyebrows only creasing in deeper furrows. "And now for...'the Gogolala Jubilee Jugband.' " Once again I swear I heard him mutter something to the effect of "That doesn't sound culturally uplifting". However, he just stepped offstage and the curtain opened to a group of hillbilly Muppets actually producing an acceptable rendition of "I'm My Own Grandpa".

While they were performing, our double-headed waiter returned with the sodas for me and Kermit. I took a swig, trying to gauge Kermit's reaction. I'd stay if he stayed, I'd go if he went. Wouldn't it be funny if he was judging by the very same criteria?

Suddenly, after the hillbillies' number had ended, as well as "the Amazing Marvin Suggs and his Muppaphone", the waiter returned. "Excuse me—" put in one head.

"—are you Kermit the Frog?" continued the other.

Kermit glanced around him, almost like he was expecting the waiter to have addressed someone else. "Er, yes..." he replied hesitantly.

"Well, there's a—"

"—call for you—"

"—from the editor—"

"—of _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_."

Giving a bit of a start, Kermit shot a look at me, as if to say "May I?" "Go ahead," I instructed. He got up and followed the waiter to the back of the restaurant, leaving an empty seat and a fly-topped cream soda.

As I watched, the band in the orchestra pit got up and left their instruments. I wondered why, because there was no way the floor show was over already. Maybe they were part of a union, and weren't forced to play more than two-and-a-smidgen numbers in a row without a dinner break. Or there was something in their contracts stating that after a Wayne-and-Wanda number, they weren't required to play through much more of the show. Or perhaps—

"Hey Phyll, you dig? Whatcha doin' here, man?"

I gave a start and turned. I'd been so engrossed in making up reasons for the band's disappearance that I hadn't noticed them making their way to _my_ table. The bass guitarist was speaking to me now, a lilac-skinned Muppet with _very_ bright orange whiskers and hair brought back in a ponytail. He was wearing a 40's newsboy cap as well as a red shirt that looked like something you might see in a high school marching band. He was squinting at me through a pair of blacked-out sunglasses with somewhat of a detached air, the hippie-like mood of someone not tight to earthly possessions. I couldn't understand what he was doing here, much less his fellow bandmembers. My face must've been blanker than a clean sheet of paper, because the dude just snickered and commented, "Not exactly the fastest hepcat tonight, huh, cus?"

Suddenly I gasped in realization. "Sergeant Floyd! Is that _you?_"

He laughed roguishly. His voice was light as air, though with rough edges. "Took you long enough to remember," he needled through his sniggers.

I laughed too. "Yeah. But _how_ am I related to you again? I can never remember if you're my mother's second cousin's adopted daughter's kid, or if I'm _your_ mother's second cousin's adopted daughter's kid."

Scratching his oversized scarlet nose, Floyd grinned again. "I'm not sure, but somehow whatever way we have the same last name...unless you've been busy since last year's family reunion." He raised his eyebrows suggestively.

I became glad for the dark, because I know I turned redder than a Washington apple. "No, I haven't," I replied defensively, making Floyd laugh again.

"Aw, I was only teasing, Phyll," he taunted, straightening up again. "But if I recall, you been rooming with that newspaper reporter _frog_..."

"It's just sharing the rent," I asserted testily. Floyd might be a big teaser, but sometimes his jokes bypassed some of the aspects of common courtesy. "There's nothing more to it." Seeing Floyd's grin widen, I changed the subject before he could begin making more unwanted assumptions. "So, you're the orchestra here then?"

Floyd scoffed. "Yeah, man. But we don' like it. See, Doctor Teeth here"—he waved a hand at a large, almost beetle-looking humanoidish Muppet with rather impressive-looking choppers—"he _refuses_ to play the piano accompaniment to any of these songs, so we're constantly hiring temps to take over. Well, none of us, not even Zoot"—this time, the blue-green sax player in the beige knit sweater and bucket hat—"enjoy the compositions, but we're getting paid enough money just to stay...so unless we can get a different gig, we're _stuck_. But even then, we have contract obligations to fulfill, and that would mean stayin' _here_ a coupla' more years, by which time the gig gets someone else..." He sighed in irritation. "But on the sly we've got our own hard rock-band going, 'The Electric Mayhem'. So if we ask real nice maybe the Man would let us go so we can break into radio." He put a rather bitter emphasis on the words "real nice", and when he said "break into radio" some of the bandmembers behind him exchanged glances.

We paused in silence for a while, but then another question occurred to me. "Why'd you abandon the orchestra pit?" I asked. "The show can't be over yet."

Floyd grimaced, taking a glance towards the stage. "Well, the next act doesn't need a musical score, so we figure we should be able to stretch our legs. It's only a few minutes long, but somehow or other the guy always manages to stop production and delay his appearance on stage." I started another question, but Floyd answered it before I could begin speaking. "The boss would've let him go a long time ago, but he makes the rest of us look even _better_, so he's kind of an essential part of the show."

"He's worse than Wayne and Wanda?"

Floyd cocked his head, thinking. Slowly he answered, "Well...not _really_ worse, but..." Suddenly something near the stage caught his eye, and he paused. "Hey Phyll, why are those two old guys in the top box pointing and laughing at you?"

———

**WALDORF**: We've been caught, Statler!

———

I shaded my eyes and looked at where Floyd indicated. Two old guys, one with a pointy nose and a square jaw—

———

**STATLER**: HEY!!

**WALDORF**: Ha ha ha ha!

———

—and the other with a face that looked like it had been run over by a truck—

———

**STATLER**: OHH! Ho ho ho ho HO!!

**WALDORF**: ...

_WHACK._

**WALDORF**: Haha!

———

—_were_ pointing and laughing at me. "Dunno, Floyd. Never seen 'em before."

Floyd shrugged. Then he turned back to the stage and winced. "Ah, looks like they're gonna start, _finally_. And that means _we're_ gonna go." He stood up and slunk away, his orchestra members following in his wake. "See ya' in the funny papers, cus!"

Not two seconds after they'd left, Kermit returned to the table. "Mr. Zealand just wants me to make sure that I have a story I can write about tomorrow..." he explained, "...but who was _that?_"

I waved the question away, turning perceptibly redder. "A sort of cousin of mine. He's in the orchestra here, just wanted to talk." I didn't mention exactly _what_ he'd wanted to talk about.

As I turned my attention back to the stage, the disgruntled eagle returned and read almost sulkily from an index card. "And now, the frantic, fast-wheeling 'funnyman', the incredible..." He paused, coming as close as a Muppet eagle can to gritting his teeth, "...Fozzie Bear."

I sat bolt upright as the curtain parted and exposed my oddball client from this morning. I'd been so wrapped up in enjoying myself that I'd forgotten the exact reason for my being here, but as I remembered it I groaned. According to Floyd, Fozzie _might_ actually be _worse_ than Wayne and Wanda! I didn't want to have to do it, but I was going to have to sit through his act and find out.

Onstage, the bear grinned widely and bowed, scanning the audience with a turn of his head. I quickly turned up the collar of my trenchcoat, hoping he wouldn't recognize me—if his behavior at my office was enough indication, if he saw me I'd probably be dragged onstage and introduced to the whole nightclub. Thankfully, though, he didn't seem to notice me as he just went on with his routine.

"Hiya hiya hiya," he beamed, almost laughing himself, "you're a wonderful-lookin' audience, it's a pleasure to be here!" Straightening his necktie and pointing a finger at the audience, he chuckled and said, "You know, I was talking to Henry the Eighth this afternoon just before I came to the theater. I asked him, 'Hey Henry, why do you get married so many times?' And he said, 'Well, _somehow_ I have to get a-_head_!' "

The audience was silent except for the delirious laughing of Fozzie himself. The two old guys seemed to be passing comments to each other, because _they_ were silently guffawing their heads off. Kermit turned to me and mouthed, "_That's_ your client?" I shrugged, stunned. What was I _supposed_ to say when my "comedian-jealous-of-other-actors" was just as awful as those he was "jealous" of?

No matter his reception, he continued. "Well, I have also finally answered that age-old question: is there a life after death? No, there is not." Muttering out of the side of his mouth as if to pantomime someone else on stage with him, he went on, "How did you figure that out, Fozzie?" Then, speaking normally, he "replied", "Because I asked three dead people if there _was_, and none of them answered!"

By this time half the audience had begun to file out of the room, heading for either the bar or the bathrooms. I felt an inclination to head out too, but I was too afraid that if I left, Fozzie would notice and recognize me. Besides, Kermit seemed determined to stick it out. Even so, I was seriously contemplating finding some excuse to leave. But just a glance at the offstage American eagle's expression was enough to assure myself that the routine thankfully couldn't last much longer.

The bear just kept pitching 'em, even if there was no catcher there to laugh for him. "So this friend of mine, a panda bear, walks into this restaurant, see? And he orders a sandwich. Then when he finishes the sandwich and the waiter gives him the bill, the panda pulls out a gun and _shoots_ the waiter, then starts to walk out the door. Then the restaurant manager comes out and asks, 'Why'd you shoot my waiter without paying the bill?' And the panda says, 'I'm a panda, look it up in the dictionary.' So the manager gets a dictionary and looks up 'panda', and it says, '_A_ _bear_ _that_ _eats_ _shoots_ _and_ _leaves_.' " He erupted in laughter once again.

Almost as if unconsciously, Fozzie took off his hat and started twirling it on his finger. "Have you heard about the Los Angeles morgue? There are three major causes of death there: cancer, heart disease, and secondhand _smog!_"

Suddenly in a movement I couldn't perceive, the hat flew off the tip of his paw and landed right in my lap. I was paralyzed. Inevitably, Fozzie's eyes were drawn to my face...and he gave a cry of unadulterated joy.

"PHYLL-is!!"

Needless to say, the show dissolved right then and there.

———

_A/N: The song "Trees", featured in this chapter, was written by Joyce Kilmer and Oscar Rasbach and initially appeared in _The Muppet Show_. The lyrics were obtained from "The Muppets 25th Anniversary CD: Music, Mayhem and More"._


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**: An Evening of Entertainment

Fozzie jumped right off the stage and ran up to my seat, shaking my hand vigorously for no apparent reason. "Phyllis! You came after all!"

"Er...yeah..." I answered. I was at a loss for words. "I...uh...needed some...firsthand information to help me...ah...solve the case."

My arm kept jittering up and down; he hadn't let go yet. "Oh, Phyllis, you saw my act, right? Right? Right?"

I kept private the observation that I couldn't _be_ here if I hadn't been watching his act. "Yeah..."

He just kept shaking my hand. "How'd you like it? How'd you like it?"

I glanced over Fozzie's shoulder at Kermit, who'd yet remained unnoticed. He shrugged and shook his head blankly, also at a loss for adjectives. It was up to me. "It was..." I fumbled, "..._inventive_."

———

**WALDORF**: Translation—it was TERRIBLE!

———

He couldn't have been more ecstatic if I had proclaimed him King of England. "Oh yeah!!" Fozzie cried, still not letting go. His hat was lying unrecovered in my lap. "Thank you, Phyllis!!"

I half-smiled, shooting a desperate, insistent look at Kermit in the background. He just stayed in place, though, and I had to incline my head urgently at Fozzie before he did anything. "Er...I liked it too," he put in in his reedy voice.

Fozzie literally jumped, finally terminating the handshake. Whirling around in midair, he spotted Kermit at long last and started shaking _his_ hand instead. "Oh, hel-LO! How are you? Are you having a good time at the Theater? What's your name? Where do you work? Do you take Alka-Seltzer twice a day, or just on the weekends?"

My companion had to clear his throat before replying. "Er...I'm Kermit the Frog," he stumbled, trying to keep his arm from being wrestled out of its socket. "I'm a...I'm a newspaper reporter." By now every remaining eye in the nightclub was on us, and I started to feel very self-conscious. Something had to be done, or we'd be making the twelve-o'clock news for disturbing the peace.

"Ah, Foz—" I began, making the bear promptly turn away from Kermit and start shaking _my_ hand again.

"Yes, Phyllis?"

I recovered my bearings. "I think you're wanted over there," I said, gesturing with my free hand at Sam the Eagle, who was giving Fozzie the most disapproving stare I'd seen him use all evening—even during the Marvin Suggs act. Fozzie almost literally drooped when he saw who I meant, and dropped my hand. He shuffled away almost dejectedly, and I felt practically _sorry_ for him. "Fozzie..." I called.

The sympathy evaporated when he actually _ran_ back to me. "Yes, Phyllis?"

"...You forgot your hat." I handed it over to him, and he beamed.

"Thanks, Phyllis!" he shouted, and bounded merrily over to the eagle. I watched him go with unguarded relief. At least _that_ was done with.

I turned around again to see Kermit observing me. "What was _that_ all about?"

Flushing indignantly, I answered, "I was just giving him his hat!"

"...I _meant_ that whole 'jumping offstage to shake your hand'," he replied. My mistake in understanding made me color even more.

"If you think _that's_ something, you should have seen him when he came in to plead his case!" I retorted. "He practically _hugged_ me when I gave him first-name terms!"

Kermit didn't seem pacified, but he let it go at that and we just settled down to wait for the show to continue. I didn't like this. What did he think I'd been doing all afternoon, going out with Fozzie or something? It was the _opposite_ that was true, I'd left the office to _avoid_ the bear! And what reason had Kermit to be so..._jealous?_

People started streaming back in once it had become clear that Fozzie's act wasn't still going, so the tables started filling up rather rapidly again. At last the musicians also returned to their instruments, Floyd just pausing to mime some annoying insinuation to me before heading to the pit and his guitar. I was sorely tempted to strangle him, but aside from the fact that it's extremely hard to kill a Muppet—only the Muppets themselves have the know-how—but I wouldn't have had the nerve anyway. So I was forced to just leave it at that.

Eventually the show did go on, with two incredibly weird numbers called, respectively, "Java" and "Hugga Wugga". Then came the famous "Mahna Mahna", three _more_ inexplicable numbers (including a piano solo performed completely by chickens), and then the eagle returned to the stage. Fozzie wasn't with him—I could at least thank my lucky stars for _that_. His eyes once more shifting from side to side, the eagle announced from another cue card, "And now, for your dining pleasure, 'The Great Gonzo' will shoot himself out of a cannon and, he hopes, _land on his head_." The last quartet of words came out rather annoyedly. I was getting the vaguest feeling of déjà vu when the curtain opened once more—to the selfsame little guy with the nose that I'd bumped into on my way out of the pay phone. I sat straight up in surprise, earning me a quick glance from Kermit. But I hardly noticed. He was the _only_ person I'd heard give the "sideshow acts turn into big TV stars" line that I _hadn't_ asked about knowing Fozzie, and yet here he was obviously having to have _some_ connection with the bear. It was making my head spin.

———

**STATLER**: You think THAT'S something, wait'll you read the REST of this!

**WALDORF**: Huh? Why?

**STATLER**: Well, anyone actually wanting to stick through to the end would sure make MY head spin!

**WALDORF**: Wait a minute...I thought WE were going to have to stick through to the end!

**STATLER**: WHAT?

_SWIVVVVV..._

**WALDORF**: Hey, your head really IS spinning!

———

At any rate, the guy—Gonzo—stood up on stage. He wasn't much taller than Kermit, as I'd noticed at the pay phone, but he gave the illusion of height by stretching himself up on his tiptoes. In the afternoon he'd been wearing normal casual attire, but now he had on a whole Superman-esque costume, cape and all, with a helmet too. In that same nasally voice that had annoyed me so much before, he proclaimed, "Ladies and gentlemen, I, The Great Gonzo, death-defying stuntsman, having before tonight hypnotized myself into holding up a 500-ton weight, ridden a motorcycle jump landing between the two old guys up there"—the geezers in the balcony seats shivered—"grown a plant to 'the 1812 Overture' and even, yes, even _sung_, will now, in my usual tradition, become a human cannonball..." He paused in what he apparently considered as dramatic emphasis. "..._without_ _a_ _net!_"

I was expecting some of the patrons to be shocked, but seeing as the biggest majority of customers were Muppets, they just shrugged it off as an everyday occurrence. Well, it probably _was_ at this nightclub, but you get my drift.

Onstage, two Muppet stagehands wheeled up an enormous, dark-blue cannon and readied it for launching. Gonzo made a big show of climbing into the cannon, then started the countdown himself. "Three—two—one—"

_KA-BLAM!!_

I heard one of the people at a table nearby whisper "Maybe he blew himself up", but no such luck—he landed with a _splat_ on his head not two feet in front of the stage he'd launched himself from. To only _very_ scattered applause, he got up, bowed dramatically, and exited stage right. Sans overenthusiastic bear, I figured that this might not be such a bad place after all, if even a klutzy human cannonball could perform. And at eight P.M., the night was young enough to spend the rest of it here.

I was just getting warmed up to order another drink when the eagle shuffled back onstage, closing the curtains behind Gonzo. I leaned back, as interested as I'd been all day. I'd thought I'd seen it all, but been proved wrong by one single trip to a nightclub. What else could I be shown this evening that could top what I'd already seen?

Reading from another notecard and obviously not liking it, the eagle announced the next act. "And now, the one the _only_..." He paused. It might be easily mistaken as an attempt at drama, like Gonzo's pause, but I'd learned to read this Muppet easily enough to tell that he simply disapproved of this one act even _more_ than the others. "...Miss Piggy."

He shuffled offstage with a shake of his head, leaving the curtains to open very slowly behind. Then the curtains fluttered very swiftly and suddenly, making me jump. I had the passing impression of glitter when the curtains closed back up again. I chanced a look at Floyd in the orchestra pit—his eyes were unreadable through his sunglasses, but from what I could see of his face he had on a scowl. That surprised me too; Floyd may have been a rather evil joker, but I'd never seen him so filled with annoyance bordered practically on _distaste_. I just turned back to the stage, head spinning with curiosity. What could have riled Floyd so much about that simple curtain flutter? He'd seemed annoyed before, but only really started getting this severely indignant when the eagle had announced the act. So what was up? Who was this "Miss Piggy"?

Before I had a chance to wonder any more, I realized that there was suddenly a _pig_ on the stage. I hadn't seen her get there, so naturally I had another double-take. She was short, but taller than Gonzo, Wayne or Wanda. Lemony yellow-white hair curled downwards to her rough-cut shoulders and framed almost breathtakingly her jeweled blue eyes. She had almost as few curved edges as me, but unlike myself she made that image work. Appearance didn't matter so much to me though, because, as a detective, I needed a _brain_ more than looks. Besides, I just didn't _do_ the dating scene. I'd never gone on a _real_ date in my life—just these outings with Kermit came anywhere remotely close, but still about a hundred miles away; we were pals and that was all. But as this "Miss Piggy" appeared onstage with that V-necked silver dress and her whole complete appearance, I took an immediate dislike to her. She just—flamed up some sort of opposition in me that even now I can't fully explain to total satisfaction. But there she was, standing in a spotlight, and I _despised_ her.

Taking a microphone in two gloved hands, she began to sing rather softly as she slightly swayed in front of the still-closed curtains.

"_No_ _matter_ _what_ _life_ _may_ _bring,  
__No_ _matter_ _what_ _I_ _may_ _doooo_...  
_Be_ _sure_ _of_ _one_ _special_ _thing:"_

She inhaled ever-so-slightly, bristling another wave of dislike in me.

"_I'm_ _gonna_ _always_ _be_ _lov-ing_ _yooooooou_..._"_

Just then the curtains _ripped_ open, revealing a whole, gigantic background entirely silver and glittering. At the same moment there was a huge, fast-tempoed piano intro, much to Floyd's apparent distaste. The pig dropped the "cute" act at once, strutting across the stage arrogantly, making sure that her skirt waved and folded at exactly the right places. She started really belting it out now, no softness this time, but still annoyingly elegant and big-stage-production-esque.

"_I'm_ _gonna_ _be_ _a_ _movie_ _star  
__And_ _I'm_ _gonna_ _learn_ _to_ _drive_ _a_ _car  
__Gonna_ _be_ _a_ _veterinarian_ _too,  
__And_ _I'm_ _gonna_ _always_ _love_ _you!"_

The band did a whole jazzy solo at that, putting special emphasis on the saxophone. Floyd's scowl was deepening further and further with every measure, whether in dislike of the music or the pig in general I couldn't tell. But my blood was boiling as she flipped her hair sassily, practically daring a man to come to her apartment and find out just how long she _would_ "always love you".

"_I'll_ _be_ _the_ _cutest_ _model_ _you_ _ever_ _saw,  
__Then_ _I_ _think_ _I'll_ _study_ _criminal_ _law,  
__Then_ _I'm_ _gonna_ _learn_ _to_ _scuba_ _dive_ _too,  
__And_ _I'm_ _gonna_ _always_ _love_ _you!"_

I shot a glance at Kermit, and another wave of flames ravaged my insides. I didn't like the way he was looking at that pig, like he'd never seen another Muppet before in his life. Almost like he couldn't take his eyes off her if he was paid a million dollars, more money than either of us had ever seen in one place, unless it was on a bill. I disliked the pig now even more. A burning desire to get out erupted in me, and I listened to it. Setting down my glass, I said as amiably as I could through gritted teeth, "Kermit, let's go."

He turned and looked at me startledly, as though he'd forgotten that I was there. The sparks of hostility I was harboring grew larger. "Why should we go?" Kermit asked detachedly. "It's only eight. And I want to at least stay 'till the end of this act. I'd rather like to meet this Miss Piggy." A faraway look invaded his eyes as he finished his last statement.

"_Well,_ _I_ _don't_._"_ That's what I _wanted_ to say. But I literally bit my tongue on it while the pig bantered on about what else she was going to do and how she would _still_ love you after all that. It was making me testy. "I—I have a headache, I don't feel so good," I insisted, jaw clenched tight.

———

**STATLER**: I wouldn't feel so good either if I had to sit through Miss Piggy's act!

**WALDORF**: You wouldn't feel so good if you had to sit through ANY Muppets act!

**STATLER**: Well, that's true!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: OHOHOHOHO!

———

Kermit snapped back to attention. "You don't? Well, why didn't you _say_ so?" he cried out, standing up immediately. His chair clattered to the floor behind him as he started to lead the way back through the hat-check. "Come on, let's go then!"

A rush of bitter triumph gave me strength enough to walk out the door, even though Kermit was observing me concernedly. I waited until we were outside before chancing a venomous grin to myself. We wouldn't be coming back to Uncle Henson's Theater until Miss Piggy stopped performing, if _I_ had anything to say about it.

We walked the way home to our flat in silence.

When we got there, we trashed all the bills accumulating on our doorstep and went our separate ways. Kermit headed straight to his room after a quiet "See you in the morning", and I heard the door lock with a click. I myself went over to our meager TV set and started channel surfing, but stopped halfheartedly. Can you believe it, four basic channels and nothing but a James Bond flick, in the last ten minutes of the movie at that? Tiredly I got up and ate a few Cheez-its, the spoils of last week's detecting. Lost cat. As always.

I headed to my room after finishing at the toilet, yawning. Nine-o' clock on the minute. I heard a noise in Kermit's bedroom as I passed, and stopped. Pressing my ear to the door, I heard it again. It was Kermit speaking softly. "Piggy," he murmured. "_Miss_ Piggy." I ground my molars and passed on to my room, where I changed into a t-shirt and soft pants and went to bed. I went to sleep almost the second I hit the pillow.

* * *

Five hours later I woke with a start. It was extremely dark so I couldn't tell automatically that that _was_ the time, but at once I knew that it most certainly was not morning. I rubbed my eyes. Why'd I wake up? On a good day I didn't get up until at least eight-thirty, eleven if I'd been out late, but _certainly_ not one-thirty AM.

Then in a flash two things happened. First, a fuzzy mass of tan fur flung itself at me in the darkness, wailing, "I didn't do it, Phyllis! I really didn't! You gotta help me!"

And before I could get over the shock of Fozzie being in my bedroom this late at night, my door flew open to a panicky Kermit in his bathrobe, gesturing wildly and holding the telephone in one hand.

"Phyllis! It's the editor of _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_! It's about Uncle Henson's Theater! _He_ _says_ _the_ _manager_ _was_ _murdered_ _last_ _night!!_"

———

_A/N: The song "I'm Gonna Always Love You", featured in this chapter, was written by Jeff Moss and initially appeared in _Muppets Take Manhattan_. The lyrics were obtained from "The Muppets 25th Anniversary CD: Music, Mayhem and More"._


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**: Murder Rap

**STATLER**: Ho! Very nice title!

**WALDORF**: Huh? What title?

**STATLER**: Aw, go back to sleep, you old coot, you're not missing much.

———

In the kitchen, I broke open a box of saltine crackers while Kermit warmed up the water for a pot of coffee. Fozzie just sat in one of the only two chairs, hysterical. "I didn't do it!" he insisted piteously. "I really _didn't!_"

I picked his hat up from the floor where he'd inadvertently thrown it just seconds before. "OK, Fozzie. Now just calm down." A little lamely, I offered, "Have a cracker."

"Thanks," he sniffled, then threw himself headlong at the box. He devoured almost the entire contents before he started slowing down. I tried not to roll my eyes, something I was usually very good at. Finally Kermit finished with the coffeepot and poured three mugs—the only ones we hadn't been forced to sell—then sat down himself. He gave everyone about a minute to have a drink, then went straight to business.

"So, Mr. Bear," Kermit started, putting down his cup. Fozzie turned immediately, like a dog who hears his name called. Maybe it was his status as a midnight comedian, but he didn't seem affected by fatigue at all considering the hour. Kermit, for his part, had the instincts of a reporter and was subliminally instructed to stay awake when a murder occurred. Me, it was just the coffee.

"Yes, sir?" Fozzie answered.

Kermit jumped a little and glanced over his shoulder. He wasn't used to being addressed as "sir"—one of the hazards of his occupation. But soon enough he turned back to the conversation. "Well, Mr. Bear, um...what exactly happened to you?" he inquired, stirring his coffee. "I just got the news that the manager was killed a minute ago."

Fozzie shivered, putting down his coffee. "I was at home, you know, just reading," he began. "It was about one o' clock. But then—"

"Hold it," I interrupted, and Fozzie turned and stared intently at me, making me flush some. I wish I'd had on my trenchcoat instead of my pajamas, because it was unnerving to interrogate someone when I was still suffering from sleep deprivation. I went on, though. "Well, uh, I understand you might be a night owl—"

"No I'm not," he interjected, grinning widely. "I'm a _bear!_" I almost heard the lame-joke-drum beat in the background. "Wocka wocka!"

"It's an expression," Kermit explained tiredly, pouring a little more coffee into his mug. I wouldn't have been surprised if he'd slipped an aspirin in after it; it was a real headache dealing with this character. "Go on, Phyllis," he insisted, taking rather larger a swig than necessary.

"All right," I started again. "So, I'm not accusing you of anything, but why were you reading at one in the morning? Unless you don't sleep at all, you should have by all rights been at least getting _ready_ to sleep. And if not, at one in the morning there isn't too much light. If I guessed your financial situations right, I'd say that you don't have very much electricity running in your flat." I took a breath. Assumptions were hard work, especially with my talent of picking the exact wrong story to pin on my victim. "So, I'd have to say that you'd need to use some sort of candle to read by, and with all the trouble of lighting one and keeping it burning, as well as making enough light to read by, it wouldn't be worth all that trouble to read something right then."

I stopped there, waiting for the reaction. Both Kermit and Fozzie were staring at me open-mouthed and silent. Then Fozzie exploded, "Whoa! Are you a _psychic?_ I mean, you got all that stuff right!" He was looking at me with unconcealed awe. Never, not even when I'd "complimented" his act, had he been so impressed with me.

"Just a detective," I replied, unused to people actually looking up to me. I mean, of course I'm their hero when I find their missing pet, but then it passes and they don't recognize me when I greet them on the streets. I returned to my purpose, though. "But back to what I said before. If all that was true, why would you read at that hour with that supply of light? If you don't have night-vision, you'd go to a load of trouble just to read. Is that what you were _really_ doing?"

"Oh yeah yeah _yeah!!_" he asserted, snapping back to normal. "I _was!_ I don't care _how_ much trouble I have to go through, every night I _always_ read 'Dear Abbey'. It's just so _heart-wrenching!_ I mean, one of those people writing, their mosquito netting was down, and—"

"I'm sure that's very interesting, sir," Kermit put in, making _Fozzie_ jump this time. If not being used to getting called "sir" was grounds enough, these two were birds—eh, frog and bear—of a feather. "But could you please get on with your story?"

———

**STATLER**: Why, haven't you tortured us enough ALREADY?

**WALDORF**: Apparently not.

———

"Oh yeah..." The bear scratched his head. He was wearing the same polka-dot necktie as before—making that the same whole ensemble he'd been wearing all day. It was a bit unusual for him to still be wearing his day clothes at this time of night, but he had a good enough alibi for being awake and reading, considering his character, so I suppose that the clothes thing checked out as well. "So I was reading, see, and the doorbell rang," he explained. "So I answered it. I didn't know who it could be, but it might have been something important, like my gagman Gags Beasley. Or my writer, the hatrack. So I just paused to smooth my fur and then I opened the door." He paused. "And then I came here."

Kermit frowned, consequentially making his entire head change shape. "And that's _it?_"

Fozzie seemed confused, making Kermit even more irritable...he didn't show it, but I could tell. But I was used to the bear's speech habits by now, though, so I just worked _with_ them rather than against them. "Who was at the door, Fozzie?"

"A bunch of police officers," he stated matter-of-factly.

I sighed. "All right, so it was a bunch of police officers. But what happened then?"

Fozzie cringed. "Well, I opened the door and the policemen said, 'We know what you did bear so come clean.'," he narrated, pantomiming both himself and the police officers during his retelling. "And I said, 'I am clean, I took a bath last week. Wocka wocka!' So they got annoyed and said, 'You come to the station with us. We know you killed your boss, Sam the Eagle.' And I said, 'No I didn't!' And they said—"

"Hold the phone!" Something Fozzie had said had struck me. I leaned down towards the table and held my pointer finger up to the bear. "Are you telling me," I said slowly, "that this boss of yours that you thought paid unusual attention _and_ unusual _salary_ to Wayne and Wanda is the _same_ _guy_ that was announcing the acts at the club?"

"Well, yeah," he replied, scratching his head. "I thought you knew that."

"I _should_ have known it." How could I have been that stupid? I remembered now that when Fozzie had been in my office, he'd called his boss Sam about three times during the whole interview. And then when the eagle had _addressed_ himself as Sam, then heaped praise on Wayne and Wanda while showing dissatisfaction towards the other acts—I could have slapped myself for not seeing it before. Actually, I _did_ slap myself, earning me some concerned looks from both Kermit _and_ Fozzie. To distract them from my schizophrenic behavior, I decided to continue with the cross-examination. "...So Foz, what happened after you told the policemen that you didn't kill Sam?"

He blinked, then gave a start. "Oh, the _policemen!_ Oh yeeeaaaahh...Anyways, so I said 'No I didn't!' And then they said 'You're resisting arrest so you must be guilty, now get him boys.' Then I ran away. That's it."

A silence settled as Kermit and I mulled it over. Fozzie, however, just took another sip of the coffee. "What, no marshmallows?" he asked. We ignored him.

Finally, Kermit said, "Well then...Mr. Bear?"

Once more Fozzie perked up. "Yes, sir?"

Kermit was about to say something, then shook his head. "This whole 'sir' thing is getting annoying. How about I just call you 'Fozzie' if you call me 'Kermit'. OK?"

The bear reacted much the same as he had that—actually _yesterday_—morning, when I had given the same terms with my name instead of Kermit's. But once he'd calmed down, the questioning resumed. "So," Kermit continued from his broken-off question, "Fozzie"—the bear's head swiveled instantaneously in Kermit's direction—"you said you ran from the policemen. But why'd you come here? I mean, how did you know that Phyllis lives _here?_"

"And how'd you get _in?_" I stuck in. I wanted to make sure that this sort of thing didn't happen in the future, _especially_ with Fozzie again.

Fozzie took another worried sip of his coffee before answering. "Well, I was _scared_, you know?" he continued, a ring of the drink around his mouth. "And I didn't know where I was going. I was just running, see?" He guzzled some more crackers, then wiped his mouth with the back of his paw. "So I thought 'I'll find Phyllis, she'll help me, she knows everything.' " I reddened at that. " 'Except that my name's not Mike Oznowicz.' Then I went to Phyllis's office. But Phyllis wasn't—_you_ weren't there. And the janitor guy, he didn't know where you were. But he let me in your office 'cus I asked if I could go in."

I made a mental note to make sure that George the janitor cleaned my office _only_ when I was in—and to take away his key. If he gave it to Fozzie, he'd give it to _anyone_ who asked.

———

**STATLER**: You got THAT right.

———

Fozzie ate a few more crackers before going on. "So I went in, and thought 'Maybe if I wait a while, she'll show up.' But then I thought 'What if a _policeman_ shows up?' So I got scared again and..." he lowered his voice in embarrassment, "...hid under the desk." Fozzie perked up again, though, when he explained his next actions. "But when I was underneath the desk, I found a bunch of papers that had fallen out of the garbage can." I _knew_ I should have been more careful sweeping those things off my desk. "And I looked at them, and saw that it was a bunch of bills and stuff from some guy named 'Uncle Deadly' who signed in the spot that said 'Landlord'. And I saw the address it had on it, and thought 'That must be where Phyllis lives.' So I found the right building and climbed up the fire escape. Then I just opened a little door and got in. And that's when you woke up."

Kermit and I shared a surreptitious glance. It'd be a good idea to keep the fire escape door locked from now on.

Now it was Kermit's turn to be interrogated. "Then, Kermit, exactly _what_ did your editor say when he called to tell you that Sam the Eagle was dead?" I asked.

Kermit swirled a spoon in his coffee and answered almost nervously. "Well, I can't remember too well because I was still half-asleep at the time," he started slowly, "but I distinctly remember him mention how he'd called me while we were at the Theater. ...Then he said 'murder' and that woke _me_ up fast enough." He winced, and poured himself even more coffee. "I asked him to repeat himself, and he said, 'Sam Eagle, the manager of the Theater, was murdered _at_ the Theater just an hour ago. The body's missing, so it's hard to get a story out of that, but you'll have to work with what we've got. I'm stopping all the presses.' "

Kermit gasped all of a sudden, slamming down his mug harder than a meteor shower. Little droplets of hot coffee ate into the tabletop like hungry animals. "Oh my gosh, I've got to write that story or my boss will kill me!" Seeing the look on Fozzie's face, he amended, "...He'll get mad at me..." before running to his room and rusty typewriter.

Soon enough the bear and I were the only ones left in the room, him languishing in a chair, me standing and leaning against the counter. _So_ _the_ _body's_ _missing,_ I thought. _I_ _wonder_..._who_ _could've_ _bumped_ _him_ _off?_ _If_ _he_ _was_ _paying_ _such_ _special_ _attention_ _to_ _Wayne_ _and_ _Wanda,_ _most_ _of_ _his_ _employees_ _would_ _have_ _the_ _motive_. _But_ _that_ _gives_ _about_ _twenty_ _or_ _more_ _suspects!_ _If_ _there_ _was_ _some_ _way_ _of_ _narrowing_ _the_ _field_...

Fozzie interrupted me in the middle of my reverie. "Ah...Phyllis?" he asked cautiously, craning his neck to look up at me. "You believe me, don't you? You don't think that I...that _I_ did it? Right?"

I glanced back down at him, with his puppy-dog eyes just pleading to be believed. It was almost impossible to _not_ smile. "Sure I believe you, Foz." _For_ _now_, I added silently. If enough evidence pointed in the wrong direction, I wouldn't hesitate to turn him in. But for now, well, I _did_ believe him.

Handing him back his hat again, I downed the rest of my coffee. He jammed the chapeau back on his head, then fiddled with his necktie for a while. "Phyllis?" This question was just as tentative as the other. "If you believe that I didn't do it, then...who did?"

I looked at him again, ready to give a snappy answer. But it died in formation. He really _did_ think that it was that simple. It wasn't his fault. So I just sighed and replied, "Too soon to tell. Maybe get an answer tomorrow, maybe next week, maybe next _month_, maybe never." I shook my head. "A case of a comedian suspicious about his boss's actions in one night turns into murder. You'd have to cough up a lot of cash to pay for _this_ one."

Suddenly Fozzie flinched, calling my attention to him immediately. He'd acted like that in my office when I'd asked him about his cash resources. "What is it?"

Taking a gulp of air, he answered. "I—I can't pay you. I don't have any money."

I couldn't see what he was getting at. "Well...none of us do. I don't get paid very well for finding lost cats, and Kermit doesn't get paid very well for _writing_ about the lost cats. But we get by."

"But you still have _money_," he insisted, averting his eyes. If he was human, he'd have turned fire-engine red right then. "I—_really_ don't have _any_ money." Before I could request an explanation, he gave it to me. "You already know that I _really_ don't get paid much, right? But whatever I _do_ earn, I have to give back to Sam, 'cus every time I perform I break something, and then I have to pay for it. So with all that and my agent Irving Bizarre's money, I don't own _anything_. My ma pays for my apartment. But I can't ask too much from her, so I was figuring that when _you_ asked to be paid, for my other case that is, I could...work it off."

I just shook my head amazedly. "You didn't have a penny to your name, and you still had the _guts_ to go to a private eye and request an investigation?" I asked. "Man, you're lucky I didn't check your credentials like people back in the human cities would. I'd have turned you over to the cops on _sight_."

Instead of taking the phrase in stride, my line distressed him even more. "No, don't send me to jail!" he pleaded, falling at my feet. "Please! I know I can't pay you, but please please _please_ don't let them get me!" He came as close to groveling as I'd seen him do. "Please!"

I felt a little guilty now, and bent down to his level. "Relax. I won't turn you over, even if I won't make a profit protecting you," I assured him clumsily. "Nick Charles himself would have been ashamed of me. Besides, I've gotten far too interested in this case to let it get by me now." I awkwardly patted him on the back. "Now, there's a bed in my room. I won't be using it, so you can sleep in there. You must be exhausted."

"No I'm not!" Foz insisted, sitting up as suddenly and as eagerly as if he hadn't been on the edge of a nervous breakdown ten seconds before. "I want to stay up and do _detective_ things!" The words seemed to give him more confidence. He paused mid-sentence. "What detective things are you going to do?"

"Sleep," I answered, and curled up in the chair with my trenchcoat over me. "Now get some rest yourself. Or I might not let you help."

And as the bear left the room, I fell soundly asleep for the remainder of the night.

* * *

I have this amazing skill that, while I'm asleep, I can forget _anything_ and _everything_ until a few moments after I get up. So I practically went into conniptions when Foz woke me looking for a bowl of cereal until I remembered about the murder of Sam the Eagle. Then it took a little bit longer for me to remember exactly why the murder suspect was in _my_ apartment. And when I finally recalled _everything_, I felt like going back to sleep all over again. But it was too late—I was awake, so I had to deal with it.

Once I'd gotten a nutritious breakfast of Cheez Puffs and orange juice down the hatch, Kermit showed up from his room. Now, I've hardly _ever_ seen a Muppet frog blink, but he was certainly doing _something_ to get the sleepiness from his eyes. Sighing blearily, he slouched over to the cabinet and poured himself a bowl of "Flea Crunchies". Then he sat down, jammed a bent spoon into his cereal, and literally jumped ten feet in the air when he saw Fozzie sitting at the table next to him. Hanging from a cabinet, he—like myself—took a second to regain his wits, apologized, and joined us for what little breakfast we had.

When I was finished, I stood up from the floor where I'd been eating and put my bowl in the sink. Then I turned to Kermit, who was at that point snoring gracefully in his cereal. I nudged him awake, then asked, "Hey, can I see that article you wrote?"

Kermit rubbed his eyes and pointed haphazardly at a pin-up of Dick Tracy—I kept it with me for good luck. But I found his typed work in his bedroom on the dresser. It was kind of hard to read because of the numerous crossings-out and weariness-caused misspellings, but I managed to get it anyways.

"**MURDER**R** AT 'UNCLE HENSON'S TH****e****ATER';**

**SAM EAGLE, MANAGER, KILLED**

**(Kermit Frog)**

One _(houre)_ hour pa_(s)_st midnight, _(Uncel Hensin's_

_Thetier)_ Uncle _(Hensin's)_ Henson's Theatre suffers

a _(trmemndus)_ _(tremind)_ big blow—Sam the

_(Amire)_ American Eagle, the manage_(——)_r of the

_(thate) (theater)_ Theater is found_(dead)_ dead. _(Sux)_

_(sz) (suspicious)_ Suspicious of _(thte)_ the crime is

_(Fz) (Fozi) (Fozz) (Bea)_ no one. The _(boddy)_ body is

missing _(curently)_ currently _(mising) (mssing)_

_(unac)_ unaccounted _(ffor)_ for. _(Detials)_ details are

_(skek) (scetc) (skect)_ sketchy, but more soon to

come _(fromm) (fromn)_ fro_( )_m _(Ph) (phyl) (Phy)_ the police

and The Mup_(op)_petburg t_(I)_imes."

I was glad to see that he'd omitted his reference to myself and Fozzie from the article—it'd come out sooner or later, but Kermit shouldn't have to be the _bear_er of bad news. ...I know the pun sucks, but c'mon, it was five-thirty in the morning.

———

**WALDORF**: It doesn't matter WHAT time it is, puns are the lowest form of comedy next to sarcasm.

**STATLER**: Oh yeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaah, SUUUURE.

**WALDORF**: ...

———

Have you ever gotten the feeling that you're being watched?

Anyways, it seemed to be acceptable for printing in the paper, as long as the editor didn't decide to "spice it up" with rumors. That could kill the whole case—though the killing had _already_ been and done. (What _was_ it with me and puns?) I still had a hard day's work ahead of me, though, so there was no occasion to worry about _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_. So I evacuated to the bathroom, got dressed and, still yawning, put on my trench. Just as I started out the door, I was stopped by a word from Kermit. "Where are you going?"

OK, that was _four_ words, but no need to be picky.

"Investigation," I replied, leaning tiredly against the doorframe. "Come on, you've seen those movies. I have to return to the scene of the crime and look for stuff. Maybe the culprit dropped his resumé or his son or something on his way out. It wouldn't hurt to check."

Fozzie looked up at this. "But Phyllis!" he protested. "It could be dangerous! What if the criminal is still there? What if the police get you?"

I shoved a cracker into my mouth, and, looking directly at Foz, spoke around it. "Hey, I'm not the one accused of murder here."

I hadn't meant to hurt him, which was just as well since I didn't. "PHYLL-isss!" he pleaded, "Don't go! C'mon!" He then actually got up out of his chair and stumbled over to me, pulling on my trenchcoat. "Please?"

Utterly astounded, I hid my reaction under the wall of indifference I'd somehow managed to cook up. "But if I _don't_ go," I pointed out, "we won't be able to prove who _really_ killed Sam, and you'll hang for the rap when the police find you. The only way for me to clear your name is to head back to the scene of the crime, and work my way from there." It was all utterly obvious to me, but apparently a new revelation to Fozzie. I didn't know whether to sell him to the Funny Farm or to a pet store.

Dropping his corner of my coat, he scratched his head and muttered, "Oh yeah, yeah..." Kermit seemed to be watching this comedic exchange with rather amused interest. I didn't blame him—_too_ much. Looking back up, Fozzie insisted forcefully, "Then I'll go with you."

This time I was so surprised that I literally fell over backwards, landing on my backside on the tiled floor. Fozzie and Kermit, of course, got up immediately to help me back to my feet, but came just about a split-second too late as I pulled myself back up using the table. Gasping and panting, I virtually exploded, "YOU? Fozzie, in case you've forgotten, you're wanted for _murder!!_"

The bear jumped up, as though he'd had this planned the whole time. "I can wear a disguise!" he persisted, pulling a set of Groucho Marx glasses (you know, the ones with the mustache, eyebrows and nose on them?) out of one of the folds of his neckerchief. I was about to question how he'd gotten _that_ when he put them on, along with replacing his hat. "See? Completely disguised!" He then struck a pose, wide-armed and open-mouthed, waiting for a response.

_Yeah,_ _completely_ _disguised—except_ _for_ _the_ _fact_ _that_ you have no other clothes on! Actually, this was no different from usual because, c'mon, they're _Muppets_, but still it was a fact in point that he'd be recognized. I rolled my eyes. "Try _this_," I suggested, pulling one of my _older_ trenches off the hook. Acting like he was receiving the robe of ol' Merlin himself, Fozzie took it gingerly and put it on even more carefully and awestruck.

"Wow," he breathed, stretching his arms out inside the coat. Kermit stifled a chuckle beside me, and I had to follow suit. It wasn't as much his reverent treatment of the coat, which would've been funny on its own, but the fact that he was _still_ _wearing_ _the_ _Groucho_ _glasses_. It's one thing to watch someone get all worked up about a _trenchcoat_, but still another when he does it through a mask of fake facial hair. Finally Fozzie looked back up at us—still through the glasses—and I configured my face with some difficulty into a solemn expression. "_Thank_ you, Phyllis!" he gasped.

I couldn't help it—I had to say it. "You have done well, young Padawan. The robe is yours. Use the force."

I am still very proud for not having burst out laughing at that moment.

"Wocka wocka..." Fozzie proclaimed, then dropped most of his wonder. "So am I good enough now? Can I go?"

Staring for a moment, Kermit stepped forward. "Turn up the collar," he instructed, and Fozzie complied. "Then...button it up. No, _keep_ the glasses." The bear did all this, and then looked back up. He struck another of his poses while Kermit inspected him critically. Then the frog snapped his fingers, a feat everyone should be privileged to see. "That's it! A new hat!!" Sauntering over to our only closet, Kermit started rummaging through the stuff, throwing things out in order to search. ...That action was kind of pointless, though, because we had so little in there that he could've just stepped _inside_ to see all of it. "I have it!" he announced, walked away from the closet, and presented Fozzie with a vintage bowler hat. The bear took it and inspected it from all angles possible before reluctantly replacing his other hat with the new one, then turning around to be approved. I hated to admit it, but Foz really _did_ look like a completely different bear. And he was staring at me so pleadingly that I _had_ to give an answer.

"Sure, Foz," I replied with an internal sigh. Even with my limited experience with real cases, the monkey wrench called Fozzie Bear would probably end up screwing around with the case enough to make it fall apart at the seams. But who could tell? "Have a good day at the _Times_, Kermit!" I called, starting out the door for the second time. I wished with all my heart that Foz would change his mind at the threshold and stay inside with Kermit instead, and once I'd closed the door I turned around hopefully.

"Come on, Phyllis! What're we waiting for?"

Now I know why I'm an atheist.

———

**WALDORF**: A what?

**STATLER**: Oh, get a DICTIONARY, you old fool!

**WALDORF**: A fishion—a WHAT?

**STATLER**: Wait a minute, you turned off your HEARING AID? Now that's just playing ROTTEN! Come back to the story!

**WALDORF**: WHAT?!


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**: The Investigation

To my surprise, I had little or no trouble getting Fozzie to Uncle Henson's Theater. Seeing as it was the site of his boss's murder I would've thought that he'd have protested to the end of my wits, but he followed tamely enough. I don't know whether it was determination to keep on or just absence of the realization that that _was_ where we were going.

At any rate, we got there soon enough and straight inside—to a swarm of policemen. Now, I don't know whether it was circumstantial or not, but my knees started knocking. Fozzie was following right after me when I stopped, and continued past me before taking to a stiff halt and retreating behind my trenchcoat, trembling. I'd never been blamed for a murder before, so I couldn't really imagine what it's like to be on the run and yet go straight into the midst of the cops.

I'd never seen policemen investigate a crime scene before, _especially_ not a Muppet force. Well, I had been _born_ in a human community, and even though there's plenty more crime over there in _those_, I'd been indoors enough in my life to not know about these things when they happened. It was interesting in a sort of ironic way, considering that if they got enough evidence to get Fozzie, _I'd_ be locked up too as an accomplice.

Within a minute or so of our arrival, one of the officers noticed our presence and came over to us. Fozzie clung even tighter to the hem of my coat, seeming to shrink in size. I was worried too, but let my business side take over. The officer—well, he didn't _seem_ so much like an officer. He was a different-looking Muppet, with eyes closer to a human's than anything else, a humongous round nose and folds of skin for eyebrows. Though he was tall enough to surpass the average Muppet, he seemed like the permanently-confused type with scraggly dark hair that didn't look like it had ever seen a comb in its life. His hide was also a truly dark brownish color, like the most dark of dark chocolates. And even though he seemed almost as sweet, he was still a cop—whole blue uniform and all. In a voice not too much unlike that of Mortimer Snerd, he stated in a rather roundabout manner, "Well, umm...uh...yeah...well...Hi."

———

**STATLER**: Mortimer Snerd...you know, it's been YEARS since I've heard THAT name...

**WALDORF**: It's been years since you've heard ANYTHING!

**STATLER**: Oh shut up, hearing-aid-cheater.

**WALDORF**: Heh heh heh!

———

I cast a surreptitious glance at Fozzie, who was still cowering behind me. I hoped that the Groucho glasses still hid his identity as well as they had in the apartment. "Well...Hi to you too, sir," I replied, turning back to the officer. The nametag on his uniform read "Beauregard". I also noticed that there weren't too many badges pinned on him—while this was a good thing that Muppetburg didn't have much promotion in store for simpletons like him, it was also a _bad_ thing because his superior officer might have enough brains in his head to see through Foz's disguise. Sending a furtive glimpse past this "Beauregard", I studied the present police force. Of course there were a lot of cops there in general, but it didn't seem like such a bad number to have to deal with. I couldn't pin the label "Chief of Police" on any of them, but he must have been there _somewhere_ with a case like _murder_. Besides the present character, there were about eight or so more typical minions of the law as well as two uniformed police dogs and two (by the looks of their lab coats) forensic officers. Maybe letting the bear come had been a bad idea.

"So, uh..." Beauregard interjected, startling me out of my calculations. "What are you doing here?"

I pulled a business card out of the inner pocket of my coat. Actually, it was a business card for Shoeshine Scooter's that I had picked up on my last visit, but that was all right since it was just for effect and I had no intention of handing it over. "Phyllis Pepper, private investigator. I'm here because of the murder of Sam Eagle."

"Aren't we all..." Beauregard responded a bit detachedly, but thankfully for my inquiry another officer showed up from behind him.

"That's enough, Beau," he growled, waving the addle-headed cop away before turning back to us. I started in surprise. It was the same eight-foot-tall, fuzzy yellow-eyed Muppet I'd seen at the pay phone the same day I'd inadvertently run into "The Great Gonzo". Now that I saw him in uniform, I _also_ saw his amazingly huge jaws with the six-inch _fangs_. I also realized with some dismay that _his_ badges denoted him as the Chief. He had on no nametag that _I_ was prepared to look at. "Now," the giant continued, narrowing his eyes at us, "what's this I hear about a private investigation?"

It took me a minute to get my mouth working properly again. "Er...just what I said to the other guy. I'm here about the murder case. Phyllis Pepper."

He eyed me disfavorably. "This is a Muppet-related case. We're authorized to only have to let _our_ force in to investigate the crime." He bent down to my level, a tactic that made his choppers look even more threatening. I myself felt like hiding behind something. "And besides, what interest," he rumbled, "would a high-and-mighty _human_ have in solving a _Muppet's_ murder?"

The racist comment stung, but it wasn't unexpected. Not everyone looked at the idea for an inter-species town favorably, and my living here had been rejected by City Hall twice before the mayor had overriden the veto. Rowlf's statements at Movin' Right Along about my applications causing riots had been completely correct. "Let's say," I retorted as calmly as I could, "that I have a vested interest in finding out who bumped off Sam the American Eagle, for a client. Out of concern for the Muppet community."

He didn't buy it. "Oh, yeah!" he shouted bitingly, drawing half the force's attention to the two of us—three, if you counted Foz. "Yeah! A human doing something for us Muppets! Ooh, maybe we'll dispel that rumor of humans controlling Muppets _too!_ I mean, yeah, let's all live _together!_ It's not like the _humans_ don't want to!" Then, looking around at all the staring faces, he barked, "What're _you_ looking at? _BACK_ _TO_ _WORK!_"

"Yes, Chief Sweetums," they mumbled, turning back to their duties.

I was shocked. "You let them _talk_ to you like that?"

The Chief turned back to me, eyes flashing. "Oh, that? The 'Sweetums' thing?" He laughed in nasty derision. "Maybe it never crossed your human mind that _that's_ _my_ _name!_" Before I could respond in any way, he bent down again with a sinister smile. "But no, that's a _silly_ name. Stupid. No self-respecting _human_ would be caught with that sort of name! No _way!_"

To my surprise as well as the Chief's, Fozzie popped up from behind me right then. "Hey, you—you stop that!" he demanded, obviously frightened but still vehement. "Humans are just as good as us! There's nothing wrong with _either_ of us, so you can just—stop it!"

Shocked silence met the outburst as even Foz himself realized exactly whom he'd defied. I for my part was utterly astounded at his defense of the human race. I wouldn't have expected it from _him_ of all Muppets. Heck, _I_ have problems against my own kind!

Chief Sweetums—_god_ it's hard to say that with a straight face—turned to me again, pointing a finger at Fozzie. "Who's _he?_"

It was my turn to think fast. "My client," I started, the gears in my head turning double-time. "Uhm...Mr. Oznowicz. He's, eh, the softshoe half of 'Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear'. Wanted to work at Uncle Henson's, but with the murder he's not so sure if it'll be safe...so he hired me to find the killer and put 'em behind bars."

The Chief inspected Fozzie suspiciously, then turned back to me. "No need for your investigation, then, Pepper," he grunted. "We already know for a cinch that it was that bear comedian, Fozzie." Foz shivered next to me, earning him another look from Sweetums. "What's his deal?" the Chief growled distrustfully. "He's been actin' funny, hidin' and shiverin'...does he know this Fozzie character? Or maybe"—he looked right at Fozzie with one large yellow eye—"he _is_ this Fozzie character?"

I jumped to Fozzie's rescue before he could give himself away to the Chief. "Not a chance, Chief!" I insisted defensively, patting Fozzie's shoulder as comfort for both himself and the Chief's conscience. "Oznowicz would never associate himself with such _shady_ people! In fact, he actively avoided the bear on the street! As for his behavior, well," I dropped my voice as a charade to the Chief that I was keeping Foz out of the conversation, "his mother was crippled by a policeman who accidentally shot her with a rubber chicken at point-blank range. He can't even get _near_ policemen without being a little jumpy. And he also can't stand to hear the words"—I lowered my voice even more—" '_rubber_ _chicken_'."

———

**STATLER**: She's crazy...

**WALDORF**: Why, for thinking that the ogre would fall for that phony story?

**STATLER**: No, for actually THINKING of that story in the FIRST place!

———

"Oznowicz's" almost comically-blank expression, well, that helped a bunch with my story. You had to admit, in a Muppet town the story was plausible. Especially with _this_ bear. Sweetums glared at me, though, and sweat pooled on my forehead as he growled, "Prove it."

I hoped to death that Foz had heard the implication in my previous story well enough to know what to do—though to the death of him or to the death of _me_ I couldn't be sure. Heart pounding, I bent down to Foz's eye level and said, very slowly, "...'_Rubber_ _chicken_'."

For a heartbeat nothing happened, and Fozzie's even-blanker expression was to me the epitome of our impending doom. Then, just as I was about to spew out an explanatory lie, Foz shouted out and, his foot slipping forwards, fell on his back on the floor with what I must call one of the most slapstickish drops in the business—the Three Stooges included as well. He twitched a little on the floor, then slumped stiffly.

The performance would have nominated him for (and won him) eleven Oscars if we had had that on video.

I hid my sigh of relief as I helped him back up, looking back at the Chief with an expression that very plainly said, "_Told_ you." Sighing, "Sweetums" waved us in. "OK, you can investigate," he grumbled reluctantly, "but I tell you, it's a foregone conclusion." Then he stalked off, scowling all the way.

As I pushed him through the police-investigated hat-check, I hissed to Fozzie, "That was an _amazing_ fake of a nervous reaction! Brilliant!"

He looked at me as blankly as before. "Huh?"

I was so taken off-balance that I stopped moving. "What do you mean, 'huh'?" I asked. "That thing, falling on the floor and twitching. You know, the act that just spared you from a life sentence!"

Foz just scratched his head, adjusting the Groucho glasses. "I didn't know I was supposed to do anything," he answered. "I _slipped_."

That one left _me_ blinking. Then I just shrugged and smiled, because he was looking kind of down. "Cheer up. Good luck never hurt anyone. Just remember, if anybody says 'rubber chicken' to you, act like that again."

"Why?"

I was going to give an answer, but bit myself on it. "Just do it, or our geese are cooked." So I pushed him through to the Theater once more.

* * *

I talked to a few random officers in an attempt to gather information on the case, but aside from one "Officer Crazy Harry" trying to blow us up and the two dogs ("Muppy" and "Baskerville", respectively) trying to...um...do their business on us, we didn't gather many more facts, whether to condemn or condone Fozzie. So I figured on the forensics, since they would _have_ to know _something_ about this case.

———

**STATLER**: Ha! One of those stupid Muppets KNOW something?!

**WALDORF**: That'll be the day!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!

———

I noticed with little satisfaction that those two crazy old geezers were still in their box seats, pointing and laughing.

I headed to the two Muppets in the lab coats, a melon-headed, lime green humanoid and a thin, stick-like character with a shock of bright red hair. The green one had a pair of glasses on but no visible eyes—at least not to _me_. But he seemed to see well enough to pick a piece of lint off the floor with a pair of tweezers and study it closely. I coughed to try to get their attention and Fozzie, seeming to think it was a talent he should pick up on, hacked and wheezed with theatrical gusto until the two forensics looked up at him in alarm. The one with the glasses looked over to Foz in concern, pulling up the aforementioned glasses and, I guess, _squinted_ at him. "Are you ill?" he inquired. His voice was light but supple.

Fozzie looked down at his feet embarrassedly. "Er...uh...no, sir."

The forensic sighed. "Oh, too bad. I could have tried my new invention out on you." He shrugged then, and in a motion inexplicable to both me and Foz, opened the tweezers and dropped the lint down his partner's throat. The hair of the recipient of the lint immediately stood on end as his eyes literally lit up and he began to slightly smoke out the ears. I was about to ask the green Muppet why he'd just done that, but then decided that I was probably better off not knowing.

"Sir, I'm private detective Phyllis Pepper," I offered, holding out my hand. He shook it. "And this is my client, Mr. Oznowicz. I'm investigating the death of Sam the Eagle. Would you be all right with sharing the information you've gathered on the case?"

The thin one said something, but I couldn't understand him because he said it in a series of squeaky, mumbling sounds that didn't seem to constitute any sort of sentence. But obviously the green one comprehended, because he replied, "Very good, Beaky. I thought there was a hint of sulfur and wax buildup too." Then, returning to me and Foz, he apologized, "Pardon me. I am Doctor Bunsen Honeydew, and this is Beaker, my assistant. Special forensics department, working on the side at Muppet Labs in order to better the world situation." This was clearly a subject of great self-respect for the Doctor, as he continued on eagerly. "Would you like one of our Muppet Labs exploding hats? They're very much in style. We also have exploding earmuffs (for the double-barreled effect), as well as self-destruct neckties—"

"Where can I get one?" piped up Fozzie, but I overrode him.

"Very interesting, I expect, Dr. Honeydew, but do you have anything to share about the _murder?_"

"Oh, _that_," Honeydew stated with disinterested, waving it away annoyedly. Apparently a murder was less appealing to him than exploding neckties. He turned to Beaker, who had started with the high-pitched noises again. "Yes, Beaky," the Doctor replied patiently. "I see that." He spoke to us again, inclining his head at the assistant. "Beaker was just saying how it was interesting that a human would take concern in our affairs."

I felt like strangling something, but Fozzie intercepted the statement for me. "Yeah yeah yeah, we already heard that. But who killed Sam?"

Dr. Honeydew gave him a funny look—as funny a look as an eyeless Muppet can give—and smiled a bit. "I'm afraid it's not quite that simple, Mr. Onzo—Oznowik—Mr. Oz. But we _do_ have a few theories." With some more noises from the assistant, Dr. Honeydew explained, "Well, close to one AM today the costume lady at this Theater, Hilda, went into Mr. Eagle's office and found him lying deceased on the floor. Of course, she called the police, but when we got here the body was gone. So, we scouted around a bit, and tested a few theories—Beaker, the Gorilla Detector please."

At the command, Beaker pulled a strange-looking gizmo from under one of the tables of the nightclub. Though everything in the club had been left the way it had been last night, the place still had the unmistakable look of an investigated crime scene. The gizmo was something that looked a lot like an item that might've been part of the merchandising from _King_ _Kong_, as it was a metal apparatus in the shape of a gorilla's head with a siren-shaped light on top. Beaker set it on the table, and Dr. Honeydew patted it proprietarily. "This is the prototype for the Muppet Labs Gorilla Detector™," he stated proudly. (Yeah, he actually _said_ the "™".) "In short, it will protect anyone from being unnecessarily devoured by gorillas by warning them when a gorilla enters the room. Of course, it hasn't been fully developed yet, but it has been proved to be fully functional in..." He paused and shivered. "..._several_...circumstances. And since scanning the area with the Muppet Labs Gorilla Detector™ turned up no evidence of a gorilla having _ever_ been in the vicinity of this theater, that theory was abandoned." Dr. Honeydew stopped short there with a tone of satisfied finality that stretched even into the subsequent awkward silence.

"Um," I started. "Well, were there any other theories besides the gorilla one?"

Snapping to attention, Dr. Honeydew began talking again. "Oh, oh yes..." He scratched his head again, jogging his glasses with the motion. Fozzie and I shared a look, though what he thought _I_ was thinking is a mystery. "Well, there were several others, but those are unimportant. So, we concluded that the murderer must have been one of the performers at the club."

"But why m—" Fozzie burst in, then corrected himself with a jolt of realization, "—why my _favorite_ performer, Fozzie Bear?" Seeing a hole in that statement, he elaborated. "I mean, why that _talented_, _funny_, _spiffy_, _intelligent_, _modest_ comedian?" By the end of the monologue he was smoothing his fur with a paw.

If I ever met the metaphysical manifestation of egotism, I'd give it a swift kick in the backside.

Fortunately, neither Dr. Honeydew nor Beaker seemed to notice too much. "Well," the Doctor related, prompted once more by Beaker's gibberish, "there was talk of this Mr. Bear being unhappy with Mr. Sam Eagle, and even that he'd gone so far as to hire a private _investigator_ on the aforementioned Sam Eagle." I kept indifferent curiosity on my face, hoping that they didn't know that _I_ was the private investigator mentioned. But Dr. Honeydew apparently had no knowledge of that specific fact, and he just kept talking. "And to move the body of the aforementioned Sam Eagle so quickly, the murderer would have had to go _just_ _upstairs_ of the club, as nothing suspicious had been seen by anybody outside, and everyone on the upper levels was asleep the whole time. Mr. Bear was also the only one on those floors who wasn't soundly in bed when our force went to investigate." Looking around cautiously, the Doctor beckoned me in closer. Leaning his own head in, he whispered, "And also, Mr. Bear spent the entire evening beforehand making jokes about _comatose states!_"

Throwing caution to the wind, I took a look at Fozzie. He was trembling behind his Groucho glasses, though from guilt or shock I couldn't tell. I had to keep the conversation going before he could try to make a complete denial of the whole business and give us away. "Dr. Honeydew," I asked, bringing up the main point on my mind, "why would you think that this Mr. Bear would have been stupid enough to make death jokes before a murder if he _knew_ it was going to happen? I'd think that if he _was_ the culprit, he _wouldn't_ have made those jokes!"

Beaker coached him with another string of wordless sounds, since Dr. Honeydew was a little reluctant to impart his knowledge this time. "Well, this Mr. Bear has had a...past record of such..._flawed judgment_ before," he admitted, which I interpreted as a scientific way of saying, "Well, he's kinda _stupid_." Not that I didn't _agree_ to some point, but at least he used the words with some hesitance. "He has done a few so-called 'secret' things in months past that he's tipped himself off on through his comedic routines. His resolve to visit the detective, for example, became public knowledge when he did a string of jokes about 'Sherlock Holmes' and 'Fearless Fosdick'. Frankly," he confessed, "I don't think there's any other guilty party besides him, though you're certainly welcome to look for one. All of the regular employees that could be found are in this building, with the exception of course of Mr. Bear. They'll remain here under police protection until that dangerous murderer is _caught_, because we simply _cannot_ endanger them in case Mr. Bear held a grudge against more than just poor Mr. Eagle. And if you think you've found anything that could help us track Mr. Bear down, feel free to let us know."

"I will, Dr. Honeydew," I replied, leading Fozzie away from the forensics before he could realize the true meaning of the "flawed judgment" crack. Well, I hadn't learned much, but it was a start.

———

**WALDORF**: That may be a start, but when will it end?

**STATLER**: Take my word for it, it'll keep on going until the readers start getting fed up with it.

**WALDORF**: Well, we're doing that now, and it's STILL not over!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**: The Electric Mayhem Plays

With little or no assistance from Fozzie, I interviewed the kitchen and wardrobe staff of the nightclub—with few results. For starters, the waiter's two heads couldn't agree on any details. Then the chef spoke a dialect of Swedish-English that I couldn't fathom, _especially_ when he started throwing wooden spoons at us. After we escaped from him I _finally_ got a chance to talk with the Transylvanian costume lady Hilda, the one who'd found the eagle's body. I didn't learn much in that conversation either, except that she hadn't checked for breathing when she'd seen him on the floor and that yes, the lights _had_ been dimmed. The effect of a confident, determined detective on a mission to find the crook was kind of dampered by Fozzie breaking out in epileptic fits whenever the words "rubber chicken" entered the conversation—more times than you might think—but _that_ was partially _my_ fault. But if I hadn't asked him to do it, Chief Sweetums would've been on us faster than a berserk evangelist at a Bible. So I suppose I had to be thankful for his performances at the times that the Chief was nearby.

———

**STATLER**: What's she talking about? How can you ever be grateful for a performance by that bear?

**WALDORF**: Well, I can think of ONE performance I'd LOVE to have him do.

**STATLER**: What's that?

**WALDORF**: A farewell performance!

**STATLER AND** **WALDORF**: OHOHOHOHOHO!

———

When all that excitement had been gotten over with, I towed Foz down to Movin' Right Along for a lunch break. Although a couple of drinks and badly charred hamburgers didn't make much of a meal, I had an ulterior motive for heading to the place: one named Rowlf. I was interested in seeing him again, even if I hadn't told Foz that_ that _was why we were gagging down the horrible cooking. So while Fozzie drained a ginger ale, I was stretching my hearing for at least a _hint_ of a honkytonk piano...which unfortunately eluded me. Then eventually, as we were getting up to leave, I caught wind of the sound I was looking for—and a full-fledged ensemble backing it. I made a complete turnaround, surprising Fozzie into walking into the door. Amid confused questions, I dragged him all the way to the back of the diner where I found not just Rowlf, but the whole pit orchestra from Uncle Henson's Theater, though sans a conductor.

All the instruments were set up, with Rowlf's piano just to the side of cousin Floyd's bass guitar and a wide radius of empty seats around the group. Another piano was set up too, a snazzy-looking keyboard with more of an electric sound than Rowlf's; the Dr. Teeth character I'd met before was at this one, his extravagant top hat jumping up and down on his forehead above his bright orange hair and beard, which clashed almost blindingly with his lime green complexion and gold tooth. There was a stringy-haired, yellow-orange-skinned girl Muppet in a tight-fitting tank top on lead guitar with blue-green Zoot at a saxophone and another Muppet with a fuzzy, pink head and hairless body _chained_ to a set of drums. They were playing a pretty jazzy tune, with Rowlf backing up the rest of the group. Dr. Teeth was singing loudly and forcefully, in a deep, throaty voice that reminded me a bit of Rowlf's.

"_The_ _trembling_ _trees  
__Embraced_ _the_ _breeze!"_

Playing their instruments vigorously, the rest of the musicians (save Rowlf) chorused on the next line.

"_Tenderly!"_

The sax player blew a single note twice on separate beats, prompting Dr. Teeth to sing again.

"_I_ _can't_ _forget  
__How_ _two_ _hearts_ _met!"_

Back to the other musicians, again punctuated by two short bursts from the saxophone.

"_Breathlessly!"_

Dr. Teeth continued.

"_Your_ _arms—opened_ _wide  
__And_ _closed—me_ _inside!  
__You_ _took_ _my_ _lips,  
__You_ _took_ _my_ _love—"_

He joined in with the others on the next exclamation.

"_So_ _tenderly!"_

Zoot blew the note again, then the whole band launched into an instrumental solo. Surprisingly, I found myself tapping my toes and bopping to the rhythm. I'd never thought that I really _liked_ music until I'd met Rowlf, yet here I was, jamming to the beat. Fozzie seemed transfixed as well. When the solo was over, Dr. Teeth started again.

"_Your_ _arms—opened_ _wide  
__And_ _closed—me_ _inside!  
__You_ _took_ _my_ _lips,  
__You_ _took_ _my_ _love—  
__So_ _tenderly!"_

Sax.

"_So_ _tenderly!"_

Sax again.

"_So tenderly!"_

Then they sang the last line all together, the feral-looking drummer starting a wild cannonade.

"_So_ _tender-LY!"_

A large finale, leaving all of them laughing. The drummer gave a wide grin, baring pointed teeth and "HA HA"ing almost mirthlessly. I got up at this point, and Fozzie distributed thunderous applause to the performers. Floyd, exhaling mightily, grinned. "Hey, cousin Phyll. What's diggin', man?" He inclined his head at Fozzie. "Cheatin' on the frog?"

I ground my teeth, my fists clenching silently inside my pockets. "You wish," I snapped back. I didn't really need another one of _those_ encounters with my cousin. "And I was just about to compliment you too."

Floyd laughed. "Well, don't stop _now_, cus!" he teased.

I didn't have to even start, because Fozzie did it for me. "Wow, that was _awesome!_" he cried. "I mean, really _great_, Floyd! Just—"

Floyd stopped him short. He scrutinized Foz closely, squinting a few times through his sunglasses. "Hey dude, do I _know_ you?" he asked, leaning down at Fozzie's face. The bear cringed and seemed to shrink as Floyd's accusations went on. "It'd be kind of hard to call me by _name_ if you didn't _know_ me..."

I jumped once more to the bear's rescue. I seemed to be making a habit of this—he'd darn better be _grateful_. "His name's Oznowicz, a client of mine," I interjected, subtly pulling Foz out of the targeting range of Floyd's intense stare. "I was just telling him about you. Oznowicz, meet my 'cousin' Sergeant Floyd Pepper, and likewise."

While Fozzie was "introducing" himself to Floyd, Rowlf looked up from the piano. "Hey, Phyllis!" he called good-humoredly, waving from his piano. Then he stopped and averted his eyes, looking up at me from an almost embarrassedly bowed head. "Or should I say, Ms. Pepper?"

"_Miss_ actually, but Phyllis is just fine," I replied, smiling a little bitterly—I could hear Floyd snickering behind my back.

The drummer then glanced up, and his eyes widened as he spotted me. "WO-MAN!" he shouted, licking his lips. "WO-MAN!" He started gnashing his teeth, salivating and pulling against the chain securing him to his instrument. "WO-MAN!!"

Dr. Teeth gave a raucous laugh, a gold tooth flashing in his mouth. "Yeah, just _barely_, Animal!" he cackled, his eyelids raising. He turned to me and kept laughing. "Floyd's bin tellin' us 'bout you, _Miss_ Detective," he went on implicatively.

"WO-MAN! WO-MAN!"

I felt like strangling Floyd all over again, but just turned back to him with an imitation grin over my clenched teeth. "I don't believe you introduced me to your crew, _Sergeant_."

Because he was so busy sniggering at me, it took him a minute to realize that I had spoken to him. Fozzie just kept looking between the two of us confusedly—I was pretty glad that he appeared to have no concept of the situation. "Well, cus," Floyd began, gesturing to Dr. Teeth, "That over there is Dr. Teeth, like I tol' you last night. And our drummer, well, his name is Animal."

"AN-I-MAL!" the creature echoed, stretching the syllables.

"I can understand that," I replied a bit worriedly. Animal continued staring fixedly at me, breathing heavily and smiling oddly. If he went for my throat, I was _out_ of there.

The girl rhythm player came forward as Floyd gestured at Zoot, putting his arm around the girl. "An' you know that that's Zoot. And this here's my girl, Janice."

"I mean, like, hi," said Janice by way of introduction. Valley girl. _Knew_ it.

Zoot sat up, slowly and tiredly, lifting the saxophone from his mouth. "Hey man," he wheezed in a strained voice, "I thought Janice was _my_ girl this week."

Janice squinted at him through her stringy hair. "No, Zoot. We drew straws again. It's _Floyd's_ turn. I'm _your_ girl again on _Wednes-_day!"

"Oh, right," Zoot replied, then settled down in his seat again. I wondered if he was asleep.

I turned back to Floyd again. "You have to draw _straws_ to get a girl, and yet you insist on making assumptions into _my_ lack of a love life?"

Floyd shrugged, snickering. "I dunno, cus. I guess it's just fun to see you blush when I mention the name..." He paused. "..._Kermit_ _the_ _Frog_."

As much as I tried to suppress it, the blood _did_ rise to my face as violently as a storm off the Pacific. So Floyd started laughing again, and was joined in by Dr. Teeth, Janice, and a ferocious Animal who seemed to just be following the crowd. Fozzie seemed to be completely lost, and I think Zoot _was_ asleep.

Rowlf, still at his piano, scratched himself behind the ears. "Uh, I think I might've missed something..."

"Never mind," I answered quickly. "Family matters."

"Yeah, and family _does_ matter, cus," Floyd went on mock-seriously. "I mean, if it were a life-and-death situation, and there was a _rubber_ _chicken_ heading towards you at a hundred miles an hour, I'd—"

He didn't get a chance to tell me what he would do, because with the words "rubber chicken" Fozzie started hyperventilating and then ran around in circles yelling "WOCKA WOCKA!" before collapsing on the floor to utter silence from everyone else.

"MAN," Zoot breathed, breaking the quiet, "what's he _on?_"

"YEAH," Animal echoed. "WHAT ON?"

"Medical condition," I explained hastily, pulling Foz up by the underarms. He was still panting heavily.

"Phyllis, it's _hard_ to do that whenever someone says 'rubber chicken'," he complained. "I mean, it was fine when that police guy was there, but..."

I didn't hear the rest of his griping because a thought had occurred to me. _Police_ _officers_..._Uncle_ _Henson's_ _Theater_..._employees_ _of_ _Uncle_ _Henson's_ _Theater_...

"Hey Floyd," I said suddenly, "what're you and The Electric Mayhem doing here? They recalled all the employees to Uncle Henson's Theater after last night's murder."

Floyd recoiled a little, his eye twitching almost imperceptibly. His associates, with the exception of Rowlf and Zoot, tensed too. They even looked a little..._surprised_. But Floyd got up enough guts to answer. "...We never heard of no recall...we was somewhere else...so they probably couldn't find us to tell us."

"Yeah," Dr. Teeth concurred. Janice nodded. Animal just looked wild.

I was _really_ beginning to suspect that Zoot _was_ asleep.

Rowlf looked up in alarm. "A murder?" he cried. He got up from the bench with a yelp. "Why doesn't anybody _tell_ me these things? I could've been a dead dog!"

I wasn't listening to him, because something about Floyd's reaction made me suspicious. I stepped a little closer, trying to seem as casual as I could under these conditions. "Yeah, there was a murder, at the nightclub Uncle Henson's Theater. The boss, Sam the Eagle, was killed overnight." Fozzie shivered in his coat, but I was watching Floyd's guarded expression. "Isn't that sad, Floyd? Your boss, fit as a fiddle, just ups and...dies." I stepped even closer as The Electric Mayhem backed away. The rest of the diner had gone silent—when _that_ had occurred, I couldn't tell. I was almost in Floyd's face now, and even though he was shorter than me by some I didn't have to bend down too much. "Isn't that just _depressing?_"

Animal snarled, his eyes wide. Floyd held up a hand. "Quiet, Animal." He faced me coolly. "It's not _so_ depressing. Sam was a pain. Stifled our creativity in the name of 'the American Way'. None of us liked him, 'cept maybe that Wayne and Wanda couple. Whoever bumped him off, I'd like to _congratulate_ him for this fine _public_ _service_."

Rowlf watched the exchange worriedly, and Zoot had actually sat up. Floyd and his group hadn't liked Sam very much, and couldn't have gotten out of their obligations to the Theater without first terminating their contract somehow. And death was the most permanent termination of all. Add that to the fact that they hadn't been summoned to the Theater when the police rounded up the employees...

A cold hand on my shoulder stopped me from my accusation, and I spun around to see a draconic, bewhiskered blue Muppet with pupilless eyes standing directly behind me. Fozzie took advantage of my momentary distraction to run up and cower behind my trenchcoat. I didn't blame him, because if the creepy look wasn't enough, I could tell by the tattered, dark brown suit coat that looked like it had been destroyed in a life-and-death struggle that this guy was none other than my, and apparently Movin' Right Along's, _landlord_. I'd bet that he owned _all_ the buildings on this fershlugginer street.

"Ah, Miss Pepper," Uncle Deadly lilted softly, with that tone in his voice that always reminds you of a scary movie. "I'm afraid I don't take kindly to rioters in my _establishment_."

Two seconds later, Fozzie and I were literally sailing right out the door and into the street.

Sticking his head out a window, Rowlf called to us, "Well, Phyllis, I _did_ tell you people don't like being interrogated in here!"

———

**STATLER**: See? That's JUST what I was talking about!

**WALDORF**: Huh? What?

**STATLER**: That thing I was talking about! You know, how authors always put in some little tiny details in the characters' dialogue, then expect us to REMEMBER them when they come up again! Like that dog just now, where he said in the beginning that people didn't LIKE being interrogated in that diner!

**WALDORF**: Wait...wait a minute. WHEN did you say all this? I don't remember...it wasn't important at the time...

**STATLER**: SEE? I TOLD you! HAHAHA!

**WALDORF**: ??

———

_A/N: The song "Tenderly", featured in this chapter, was written by Jack Lawrence and Walter Gross and initially appeared in _The Muppet Show_. The lyrics were obtained from "The Muppets 25th Anniversary CD: Music, Mayhem and More"._


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**: The Muppetburg Times

"Phyllis, let's _go!_" Fozzie was urging, pulling on the hem of my coat. "Floyd and his friends _have_ to be guilty! You _saw_ them! They were _happy_ that Sam was gone! It's _gotta_ be them!"

As much as I wanted to agree, I couldn't. "It's not that simple, Foz," I sighed, jerking my trenchcoat out of his reach before he could rip it. When he looked at me in confusion, I continued, "We can't lock them up just like _that_. And besides, you know firsthand that not a lot of the employees were very fond of Sam. It could be _any_ of them."

"But it _has_ to be Floyd!" the bear insisted through the Groucho glasses (which had, amazingly, survived this entire adventure). "Come on, let's just go get those police guys and _tell_ them how _guilty_ he was acting!"

I sighed. "Fozzie...do you have any concrete _evidence_ that Floyd and his groupies killed Sam?"

"Well, I..." he started. "I...well, there's..." He kept trying, but no real words came out.

"Exactly," I pointed out. "Unless we spontaneously happen upon a signed confession saying that they did it, or something equally incriminating, they stay out here—and _you_ get the life sentence when you're caught." He shuddered and threatened to break down again, so I corrected my mistake. "..._if_ you're caught." I stood up from the pavement, brushing myself off. "C'mon," I instructed, shoving my hands in my pockets like Humphrey Bogart and starting to walk down the street, "we've got somewhere to be."

Fozzie stood up and, pardon the species barrier, _dogged_ my footsteps. "Really? Where're we going, Phyllis?" He hurried up until his strides evened up with mine and we were next to each other. The bear was looking up at me inquisitively with his big eyes, which to my embarrassment provoked another wave of blood rushing to my face. What was _wrong_ with me today?

I answered anyways. "Kermit would probably like to hear of our misery—it would probably make _his_ day look like a Utopia in contrast."

"Oh," Fozzie responded, and bent his head in contemplation as we kept on walking.

* * *

Have you ever read any of those Superman comics, which has the newspaper office building like a huge skyscraper topped with a globe? Well, those may not always apply in human cities, but Muppetburg was never really a city of completely practical builders. The offices of _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ newspaper were in a large, tall building painted over in vibrant colors with a statue of the founder, some nut named Jerry Juhl, on top. And on both sides of the steps leading up to the building. And in the back of the building. And also in the lobby, and I think there's another one in the men's_ bathroom_.

———

**STATLER**: And how would she know THAT?

**WALDORF**: The same way YOU knew the interior bathroom decorating habits of Queen Victoria! Heh heh heh...

**STATLER**: That wasn't Queen Victoria! That was Napoleon Bonaparte!

**WALDORF**: ...I won't tell him what a fool he just made of himself. Heh heh heh!

**STATLER**: ?

———

I'd never been inside the building, so I was surprised at the steep contrast between the blinding colors on the outside and the bland paint job indoors. The entrance hall was thickly carpeted in a sort of aqua blue color, but that was about as vivid as it got. The walls were whitewashed to a point where the paint was starting to peel, and the lobby's chairs were all covered in magazines that were so old, the main articles were interviews with Julius Caesar about his thoughts on the Fall of Rome. But even despite all the blandness, the place was full of Muppets rushing around with manila folders and coffees, giving off the air of a working environment.

I walked up to the check-in desk with Fozzie close behind, admiring the place. The receptionist was a Whatnot-type Muppet girl with a strikingly blue hide, complete with a bright blonde head of hair. She was screeching loudly to somebody on the phone, and my heart sank through quicksand as I recognized the unmistakable voice. Alice. _Just_ when I thought my day had hit rock-bottom.

Inhaling deeply, I leaned on the desk and waited until she was finished with whatever poor sap had been calling. She turned to me then, and with no apparent need to take a gulp of air, shrieked, "THIS IS _The Muppetburg Times_ NEWSPAPER. WHAT DO YOU WANT?"

I felt like just leaving then and there, but my fighting resolve surfaced. "Alice, it's Phyllis Pepper. I'm here to see a _very_ _specific_ reporter."

Scratching her head, she screeched, "WHO DO YOU WANT TO SEE?"

I put both hands down on the counter and leaned to her as I completely snapped. "Do you really have that bad a memory," I growled, "that you can't remember the one person I've been calling _every_ _day_ for the past _two_ _months_ that you've worked here, and even _before_ then—"

"Wait a minute, Phyllis," Fozzie interjected. It was just as well, because I don't think Alice's incapable mind processed threats any better than memories. "Let me talk to her."

I rolled my eyes. "You do that. I've _been_ talking to her for _months_ and nothing's happened."

Smoothing down the fur on both sides of his face, Fozzie faced Alice. "Miss Receptionist," he started, ambling easily along the road of conversation, "you know Phyllis from a long _line_—good joke! A-ah!—long line of telephones. So can you please direct us to the office she needs?"

To my everlasting amazement, Alice just simply looked back down at her desk and waved us on. "Kermit the Frog, room 203, seventh floor, third door on the right, the one next to the water cooler. Have a nice day."

I was shocked down to my shoes, and it took all the brainpower that hadn't been inadvertently shut down to reply, "Th-thank you," before staggering dumbly towards the elevators. When we were out of Alice's earshot (who was once again screaming at a caller), I stared at Foz. He looked up quizzically, and I asked, flabbergasted, "How did you _do_ that?"

Fozzie stared back at me obliviously. "Do what?"

I opened my mouth, changed my mind and shook my head instead. "Nothing."

When we got to the third door on the right on the seventh floor next to the water cooler—the one with the little yellow sticky note that read "203"—I knocked hesitantly. When I heard Kermit's voice call reedily, "Come in...", I put my finger to my lips, then pushed the door open very quietly and tiptoed into the cubicle. Muffling giggles, Fozzie followed as I stealthily made my way inside until I was directly behind the chair Kermit was sitting in. Making no sound, we just stood there while Kermit, unnoticing, kept working at his typewriter. Eventually, he called again, "I said you could come in." Then after a few more minutes of silence, Kermit looked up sharply at the door and, seeing it open but empty, got up to close it, muttering about "office jokes". After that, he started back to his seat and sat down again to work, still not having seen us. As soon as he was immersed back in his work, I very quietly leaned down near his head and hissed, "Boo!"

Yelping loudly, Kermit jumped straight out of his chair and straight onto the light fixture above his desk as Foz and I burst out laughing. Kermit was indignant for a little while, but Fozzie's good cheer infected him too and he smiled as he let go of the fixture and fell back into his seat. "Don't _do_ that," he chuckled. Then his face regained an almost serious expression. "Well, now that you've frightened me out of ten years' warts, what're you doing here?"

Fozzie piped up first. "Well, we were kind of looking for clues and stuff about, you know, Sam, and there was this _big_ guy who was the chief, and this, this other guy with _no_ _eyes_ and a guy who talks like he doesn't know words, they were for-en-sics, and then we were at this _diner_, and there was Floyd and everybody there, and we figured maybe _they_ did it, and then we got thrown out."

Kermit was momentarily stunned by this overabundance of information, then glanced at me. "Busy morning?"

"Kinda." I looked at his half-finished article. "And what've _you_ accomplished?"

"Not much," he admitted, bowing his head. "My editor, Mr. Zealand, didn't like my article on the murder, so he's making me rewrite it with as much blood and guts as I can fit in it for the evening edition."

"That's just _great_," I replied acidly, self-consciously rolling up the sleeves of my trenchcoat. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Fozzie making the same adjustment to his garment. Whoo boy, was I going to have a time living _him_ down. "Want me to go in his office and tell him something about it?"

"You can't," he insisted. It wasn't so much a statement of self-preservation as a simple fact. "Mr. Zealand won't let anyone into his office, whether during office hours or after. He only communicates by telephone, or by sending a rat messenger if it's important." Kermit cocked his head. "Actually, no one's really _seen_ Mr. Zealand for a while. His secretary says that every day when she leaves, he stays up in the office."

"Really?" This was interesting. "How long has this been going on?"

Kermit cupped his chin in his hand. "I don't know, really," he replied slowly. "Maybe...six months? I _think_ it was two months after I met you...He used to always be puttering around the building inspecting our work and throwing fish at us, or going down to get some fish out of the vending machine in the lobby, and _especially_ visiting the offices of the female workers so he could throw fish at _them_. But now..." He trailed off.

I paused in thought. "Hmmmm..." Paused in thought, I looked up to see Fozzie beginning to type onto Kermit's article. "FOZ!"

He straightened up guiltily with a cry as Kermit inspected his paper. I shook my head irritably. "Fozzie—" I started reprimandingly, but Kermit stopped me.

"Hold on, Phyllis," he said, reading the few sentences Foz had typed. "This is actually helpful information! '_Crime_ _inspeckted_ _by_ _Chief_ _of_ _Pollice,_ _big_ _hairy_ _guy_ _with_ _lotsof_ _teeth_. _Scientists_ _from_ _Muppet_ _Labs,_ _Bunsen_ _and_ _Beaker,_ _know_ _that_ _it_ _was_ _no_ _t_ _commited_ _by_ _a_ _Gorilla_. _Costume_ _lady_ _Hilda_ _first_ _to_ _see_ _body_ _of_ _Sam_ _befoere_ _the_ _body_ _disappeared_.'." Kermit looked up. "If I reword it and edit the spelling mistakes, this could be exactly what my boss is looking for!"

"Wocka wocka!" Fozzie grinned, averting his eyes and preening himself a little. "Genius runs in my family."

"I _don't_ doubt that," I answered, at this moment perfectly fine with lying through my teeth.

———

**WALDORF**: Oh, I wish I could have used THAT line! Ho ho!

**STATLER**: Yeah...good idea!

**WALDORF**: Well, genius runs in my family.

**STATLER**: I don't doubt that.

———

A thought occurred to me. "Hey Foz," I offered, squatting down to the bear's eye level. "How would you like to help Kermit some more with his article?"

He certainly perked up at that. "Oh yeah yeah _yeah!_"

I was relieved beyond speaking. "Good," I returned, standing up. "So then I'll be needing to use a telephone, and after that I'll hopefully be able to get back to the Theater."

Fozzie was _devastated_. "Phyll-_is!_ Let me come, let me come, let me come!"

I sucked in a breath of air. "Somebody needs to help Kermit here at the office, or he'll get fired for lack of information," I explained delicately. "And somebody also needs to work some more on solving this case." On a flash of inspiration, I appealed to his ego. "Someone like you, Foz," I instructed as solemnly as I could manage, "is _above_ physical investigation. You, why, you're 'genius' enough to pursue it on a—on a _spiritual_ level!"

Fozzie stared up at me in awe. "A..._spiritual_ level?"

"Yes!" The ball was rolling. "You must commune with your inner Dick Tracy, and only with his help will you be able to assist solving the case! And how, you ask?"

He was enthralled. "How?"

"_By_ _helping_ _write_ _the_ _article!_" As I had been speaking, I had been slowly moving towards the door.

"OHH..." he breathed. "I'm so _sorry_," he apologized. "For a second, I thought you were trying to get _rid_ of me!"

I didn't hear him, because at that point I was running from the room and down the hall before he could change his mind.

* * *

Eventually I got directions from Alice to the nearest pay phone, but not without a lot of screeching and misdirecting that eventually led me about ten feet across the lobby to the phone. If only I could have figured out how Foz had gotten her to answer calmly and precisely. It must be a Muppet thing.

Once at the phone, I checked very carefully to make sure nobody was watching, then did my stuff and got my illegal free call. I waited for the operator to pick up, dully counting the number of rings. _Thirty-seven_..._thirty-eight_..._thirty-nine_...

When the operator _did_ pick up, my ear was almost blown off by the sound of shrieking. "HELLO?"

I whirled around, and sure enough there was Alice at her desk, on her phone, yelling to me. I had been wrong when I thought her voice could never get more annoying—now I had the surround-sound. "HELLO? WHO IS THIS?"

I wasn't even going to bother saying it was me. "Could you put me through to Uncle Henson's Theater?"

"WHAT FOR?"

Gritting my teeth, I decided to just hang the questions and get what I needed. "_Put_ _me_ _through!_"

Amazingly, she did, and soon enough I heard the Chief's gruff voice coming in through my ear in a grumbling "Hello?" But before I could say anything, he started to hang up. "This is none of your business, so butt out! It's police stuff!"

"Don't hang up!" I cried, fervently talking as fast as I could. "It's Phyllis Pepper, Chief, the detective! Don't hang up!"

To my relief, the other phone wasn't replaced on the hook. "Pepper, huh?" the Chief growled distastefully. "Whadda _you_ want?"

I chose my wording carefully before I responded. "...Would it be all right if I talked to some of the performers? Over the phone?"

"Huh," he grunted. With all the static in the phone connection, it sounded almost like he'd muttered something unprintable—which might well have been the case. "Why?"

I was ready enough to employ my usual tact. "Because I want them to know my opinion on clotted cream. Could you just please get me Wayne and Wanda?" I had no doubt they'd be in the Theater, if they were Sam's most stalwart employees. Then again, if a murder rap was hung on Fozzie, _anything_ was possible.

Chief Sweetums grumbled about it, but eventually said, "Here you go," and stomped off. I could tell he'd just left the phone dangling from its cord, because I could hear the sounds as it smacked into things. At one point I was sure I even heard a Muppet bump into it, because soon afterwards I heard a very nasal "Ouch" and some nasty clattering.

I was afraid that the Chief had forgotten the phone and me on the other end, but after a while a young man's voice, slightly low, inquired, "Hello?"

"Um, hello," I replied, startled out of nodding off by the voice. "Uh, Wayne?"

"Yes." He sounded curious. "Who is this?"

"Phyllis Pepper, private eye, sarcastic minion and all-around cynical character," I replied. Hey, if you're going to introduce yourself, might as well do it with style.

"Oh." Wayne wasn't much of a nit-picker; that was a good thing in a Muppet. "What are you calling about?"

———

**WALDORF**: Ha ha ha ha ha! Sarcastic minion! Oh, she's a riot!

**STATLER**: Huh? What? I don't get it!

**WALDORF**: Well, Statler, she calls herself a minion, and then she says she's a SARCASTIC minion! And that's IMPOSSIBLE because a minion, you see, is always serving, and doesn't disobey or ridicule their job by definition! And so you see, there's no such THING as a sarcastic minion! Aha ha ha ha ha!!

. . . . . . . . . .

**STATLER**: ...I think we have another patient for the old fools' home, but I'm not sure which one of us it is...

———

"Excuse me," I apologized, getting that weird feeling again, "I didn't quite catch that last bit..."

"What?" I heard a pause over the phone lines. "Oh, it's just those old guys from the top box. They keep reading something and laughing." Quickly Wayne got back to business. "So, why did you call, Ms. Pepper?"

First I had to make sure of something. "Is Wanda with you?"

"Yes," a somewhat shrill female voice responded. "That's me."

"OK, good." I took a second to collect my thoughts. "Do either of you know anything about Sam's murderer?"

The two were prompt in their denial. "I should _say_ not!" Wayne insisted, and I heard him stomp his foot before muttering "OUCH".

"Never! We just know the police say it was the bear!" Wanda wailed.

All this wasn't too unexpected, though I might have been a little less direct in my approach. Their self-preservation in denying their involvement seemed genuine, but you never knew in this business. "I'm not saying that it could be you," I replied calmly. _Though_ _I_ _might_ _be_ _thinking_ _it_. "I'm just wondering, since you two were so involved with him, if you would know whether he had any enemies."

Silence from the other end as Wayne and Wanda mulled it over. Hesitantly, Wayne spoke up. "Not enemies _per_ _se_, but...Sam was never on very good terms with The Electric Mayhem," he offered. "They always used to be in his office arguing about their contract, but getting nowhere..."

"Of _course!_" Wanda interjected. "When Sam makes a decision, he stands by it! He's never gone back on a verdict for as long as we've worked for him!"

"Uh-huh." I could see an opportunity, but only as long as I could take advantage of it. "And how long has _that _been?"

Wayne and Wanda had a muted conversation of whispers over the line that I couldn't hear. I waited patiently, and soon enough Wanda responded. "A month."

This, at least, I was taken aback by. When I had heard Fozzie's original suspicions about Sam and Wayne and Wanda, I had thought that this whole "rising to power" thing had happened to the young singers at least _two_ months ago. I hid the surprise as I continued with my questioning. "You must be pretty impressive to have risen to a high standing with Sam after such a short period of employment..."

"High standing?" Wayne _really_ didn't seem to know what I meant. "Well sure we're a popular act with him, but I consider us treated the same way as everyone else! After all, it _is_ the little side acts in nightclubs that soon-to-be TV stars get discovered in."

I decided on the "innocent assumption" trick to try to get some more out of them besides what I'd already heard from Fozzie about those "little sideshow acts". "Really? I thought you were getting paid more than the other performers."

I heard a gulping sound. I'd caught at least Wayne for certain. "More than the others?" he stammered. "You must be out of your mind."

"Or a sarcastic minion," Wanda put in.

———

**WALDORF**: Ha ha ha!

———

"Oh shut up, you old coot!" she shouted away from the receiver.

_Hmm_..."So you're _not_ getting a higher salary?" I asked, pretending to be mildly surprised.

I didn't hear the rest because the other phone hung up with a heavy _click_. Well, I was definitely sure of one thing: there was plenty more to this Wayne and Wanda case. And I aimed to find out what it was.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**: The Theater Again

I was at Uncle Henson's Theater sooner than I would've thought possible, but then I wasn't used to taking a bus instead of walking. Yeah yeah, I know, you're thinking, _Is_ _the_ _old_ _Pepper_ _going_ _soft_ _and_ _actually_ spending money?

I hitched a free lift on the rear of the bus. Muppets never think to look _there_, surprisingly.

———

**STATLER**: Good thing too, or else WE'D never have been able to go ANYWHERE!

**WALDORF**: Not that we ever GO anywhere anymore...stupid Muppets.

———

I snuck in through the side alley so the Chief wouldn't be able to rag on me for coming back after I'd already called. _That_ could have become tedious, as I planned to make several such reappearances if I could piece any of the puzzle together. Provided, of course, that most of the performers at the Theater hadn't skipped out like The Electric Mayhem.

_Floyd_. The name churned sickly in my mind, and I felt not just a little bit guilty. He was my _cousin_, and I had all but accused him of _murder_ in a _public_ _location_. Not only would he never speak to me again—actually, that prospect sounded quite pleasant—but I wouldn't be able to interrogate him or his bandmembers any further about the murder. A few fingers really _were_ pointed at them, but not quite enough. Wayne and Wanda were potentially guilty, too, as was Hilda, who'd first seen the body after the murder, as well as Fozzie, even though I had been hired to _clear_ his name. In fact, as I'd stated so many times to the bear, if Sam was half the boss Foz had described him as, the whole cast of performers could be suspicious.

Only right now did I realize the magnitude of that possibility, as I entered from the alley into a hallway filled with the single largest amount of people I'd seen amassed in one area.

Dr. Honeydew wasn't kidding when he said they'd rounded up most of the workers. I saw several faces familiar to me from the previous night at the club, and sometimes simply familiar _appendages_ when no face was visible on the Muppets. I could see a whole flock of chickens congregating at one end of the hallway, as well as the little bulbous yellow guy from the "Hugga Wugga" number and, funnily enough, those pink cow-like things from "Mahna Mahna". I guess having seen only half an hour's worth of acts, I hadn't realized the sheer _number_ of employees. There were more than a dozen performers in the hallway whose acts I hadn't watched, and more and more kept ducking out of dressing rooms, bathrooms, and pretty much _everywhere_. But I wasn't able to spot either Wayne or Wanda in the crowd. _Oh_ _well_, I thought. _Maybe_ _they're_ _in_ _their_ _dressing_ _rooms_.

I picked Wayne and Wanda's dressing room out by the premise that it was the biggest and had the most gold stars on it—at least, I was _pretty_ sure it was Wayne and Wanda's. But when I knocked on the door, it wasn't Wayne's lower voice that spoke up, nor Wanda's high-pitched tones, but a sort of a throaty but high-pitched, female vocal. "Come in!"

I opened the door a crack and peered inside, not making a sound. Who could it possibly be, if not the young couple? I mean, they were the only act Sam had approved of, and otherwise it would have to be someone very self-centered and able to get their way for them to have such a decked-out room like this...

"Well, come _in_ already, you're ruining _moi_'s mudpack!" a pig shot at me from in front of her huge, wall-to-wall mirror.

My insides tensed. There she was: Miss Piggy. My loathing from last night came unbidden back to me. But why did I hate her so much? I didn't even _know_ her! It was just _one_ _act_ at a nightclub, and a steamy jazz number designed to rile up the male members of the audience at that! Were all my emotions going out of wack these days, or was I just going crazy? ...AGAIN?

———

**STATLER**: Oh, I sympathize with her...

**WALDORF**: Huh? You mean with the "going crazy again"?

**STATLER**: Yeah.

**WALDORF**: You old fool! YOU may be STUPID, but WE'RE not CRAZY!

**STATLER**: Oh really? Then why're we still READING this?

**WALDORF**: Oh no, you're right!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: AAAAAAAHHHHH!!

———

Miss Piggy whirled around annoyedly. "Look, buster," she reprimanded, "if you are going to be one of those insurance salesmen to prey on innocent _moi_, I will let you know—" She cut herself off when she caught sight of me. "YOU!" she gasped.

I was utterly lost for words. "Huh?" Original, I know.

The pig's eyes narrowed. "Don't play coy with _moi_, missy, you _know_ who I am, just as much as I know who _you_ are and what _vous_ are _doing_ here."

This pig was a psycho. "Hey look, I've never seen you before in my _life—_" I began, but at that moment she caught me with a karate chop to the stomach.

"Take _that_, Michelle Oznowicz!" she roared as my lungs took an unexpected coffee break. While I was doubled over, she kicked me and sent me all the way down to the floor. Looking down on me, she huffed, "_That'll_ teach you to steal a Paul Williams lunchbox from an innocent little kindergartner!" When I looked dazedly back up at her, she snorted. "Huh! Didn't expect me to _remember_ after all these years, right? Well, I did, and give me back my _lunchbox_, you prep!"

Getting back up, I scrambled to the far corner of the room before she could do any more damage. I flashed my wallet at her for no particular reason, one since I had no fancy-looking badge and two since it was completely empty—unless you counted my membership card for the Richard Hunt fan club. "Miss Piggy, as I presume, my name is Phyllis Pepper and I'm a _detective!_ Whatever school _you_ went to, I wasn't _at_ it! I've never _been_ in Muppetburg until I applied last year, and even _without_ that, I've never met you before in my _life!_"

Miss Piggy was shell-shocked for a second. "Oh," was all she said. She looked at me, and our gazes locked instantly. "Scooter's," we sighed together.

Then the moment was over and Miss Piggy tossed her hair, boiling my blood again. I clamped my jaw shut. What was my _problem?_ Whatever it was, the problem kept going and my insides clenched tighter and tighter as Miss Piggy ran a hand through her hair in front of the mirror. "So," she lilted, "what is it that you were wanting to see _moi_ about, Miss Salt?"

"Uh, Miss Pepper," I replied with my arms arranged protectively in front of my head, still wary in case she tried to karate-chop me again. My brain was clearing now, and I remembered the reason I'd gone into Miss Piggy's dressing room. "Well, uh, actually, I was looking for Wayne and Wanda, so I'll just be—"

"Aheh, aheh," Miss Piggy laughed fakely and softly, turning away from the mirror (with considerable effort) and looking back at me. She looked the same as before, but I could see an almost dangerous glint in her eye. "Aheh," she laughed again. "Perhaps _moi_ did not hear you right. Did you say that you were looking not for _moi_, but for that simpering couple Wayne and Wanda?"

Instinctively I tensed my arms, edging them a little closer to my face in case of attack—which by now I considered likely. "Umm...I called them on the phone, and I came in here because I thought this was _their_ dressing room..."

"Aheh," Miss Piggy giggled once more. Her eyes flashed hard again, and I could see her hands cock in preparation for another attack.

"B-but I'll be happy to talk to you first, Miss Piggy," I finished quickly. Never let it be said that I value personal interests over my own life.

———

**WALDORF**: Heh heh. Never!

———

Miss Piggy's grin was triumphant now, and she sat down on the plush pink pouf that was situated in the middle of the immense room. I noticed that there was no gesture, nor seats, for me to follow suit. In the back of my mind, I wondered if she knew the same psychiatry tricks as I did...but I decided against it. My ploys were designed to test the mental needs of my clients; Miss Piggy was just _vain_.

"So," the pig began once she'd arranged herself presentably on the pouf, "What was it _vous_ wanted to talk to _moi_ about?"

I shrugged internally. I guess starting with her would be as good as going back to my questioning of Wayne and Wanda. I flipped open a notepad, trying to look professional—a hard appearance, especially for me. "So Miss Piggy, what do you know about the murder of Sam the Eagle?"

Instantly her demeanor changed, and she grew rigid on the expensive furniture. She smiled a little too much, then jumped up and started pushing me forcefully out the door. "Well, aheh, I should not keep _vous_ here too long," she insisted as I tried to protest. "Wayne and Wanda should not be kept waiting! _Au_ _revoir_, Miss Salt!"

Before I knew it, I was on the other side of the door and she'd shut me out of her dressing room. I was even more suspicious now. That pig knew something, and I'd wager that I'd need the information more than I'd care to admit. First Wayne and Wanda hang up when I ask them about their salary, and now this...this was going to be a tough case no matter how I looked at it. I sighed. If I'd known _this_ was coming, I'd have locked Fozzie out of my office the second I'd seen his goofy grin through the glass in my window.

On the spur of the moment, I bent down to the doorknob of Miss Piggy's dressing room and peered through the keyhole. I squinted hard, trying to see if I could make anything out from the image I was getting, then gave a start. I was looking at Miss Piggy's eye, staring back at _me_ from the other side of the keyhole. I stood up quickly, and cautiously bent back down and put my eye to the keyhole again. The exact same moment I did that, so did Miss Piggy from inside. I got up again and waited a few moments before I tried again, but with the same result. It was reminding me of that famous Marx brothers "mirror" routine, so I decided to leave it off before it snowballed out of control. Especially when your opponent is a Muppet, this sort of thing could go on for _hours_. I resisted the temptation to barge back into her dressing room, because it would be completely pointless since she'd just _literally_ kick me out again. Checking out Wayne and Wanda instead wouldn't hurt anything.

I turned around and walked down the hall, searching for some clue as to where the couple's dressing room was and coming up empty. This was getting monotonous. Just as I rounded a corner, though, I bumped into a chicken coming in the opposite direction. Not knowing exactly what you're _supposed_ to say to a chicken, I just mumbled, " 'Scuse me," and tried to hurry on. The chicken wouldn't budge, though, and sat squarely in the middle of the hallway, looking up at me. I stared back at it.

"Brawk bru braw," the chicken stated matter-of-factly, but I had no inkling of what it was saying. I looked at it blankly, and the chicken tried again. "Braw bruk brawk _brawk_," it insisted, nudging at me. "Brawk bruk bruk braw _brugawk_."

I saw the purplish humanoid Muppet with wild red hair who'd been in "Mahna Mahna" walking past, so I called out to him in desperation. "Eh, excuse me, do you speak chicken?"

The Muppet stopped, then looked first at me and then at the chicken before announcing simply, "Mahna mahna," and walking away. I heaved a sigh in exasperation.

"Look, isn't there anyone in this place that can speak chicken—_besides_ another chicken?"

One of the hillbillies from the "Gogolala something-or-other Jugband", a blue, pink-nosed character with a large hat and a black beard, peeked around a corner at me. Clutching his jug, he called, "Ya might be tryin' 'The Great Gonzo'! He's the only one at this gosh-darned Theater that can tell what those critters are sayin'."

"Thanks!" I called back, then realized as the hillbilly disappeared that he hadn't told me where "The Great Gonzo" _was_. But that didn't matter too much once I looked down and realized that suddenly the chicken was gone—like the mention of "The Great Gonzo" had scared it off or something. I shrugged. Not my problem. I had to find Wayne and Wanda, not some performance artist who couldn't shoot himself more than a few feet out of a cannon.

I hopefully knocked on the doors of random dressing rooms, but the occupants were either not there or mute Muppet cows. Asking around didn't get me anywhere either, because I was more often ignored than answered. Even though the Theater probably wouldn't be up and running until the police captured Fozzie or someone else they could pin the murder on, all the performers were running around memorizing lines, practicing acts or setting up scenery, totally oblivious to my presence. I just kept asking anyways, since there was no other possible way I'd be able to find Wayne and Wanda now. The dressing rooms were many and all close together, and if I had looked hard enough I could probably have found a few underground passageways to even _more_. That didn't interest me right then, though, so I settled for scouting about for surface-level dressing rooms.

Eventually I decided that when a knock didn't receive an answer and the dressing room wasn't locked, I'd head inside to poke around. Although organization wasn't always the biggest genetic trait of Muppets, there had to be _some_ order around here, so presumably if I could figure out which kinds of acts had dressing rooms in which areas, I'd be able to mathematically narrow down the possible dressing rooms belonging to Wayne and Wanda.

———

**STATLER**: Well, if she can count, then she must be good for ONE thing.

**WALDORF**: Oh yeah? What's that?

**STATLER**: Helping out that numbers guy on SESAME STREET!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: Ohohohohohohohoho!!

**THE COUNT**: Eight, eight disparaging "Ho"s!

**WALDORF**: Hey, who asked YOU to butt in?

_SCUFFLE._

———

The sounds of a fight coming from the front of the Theater wasn't helping my predicament much.

* * *

After some investigating, I figured out that Uncle Henson's Theater did _not_, in fact, have a systematical organization for the dressing rooms of the performers, but I _had_ found a number of items in the dressing room of "The Amazing Marvin Suggs" that the police might have a mild interest in if they thought to investigate. But nothing to do with my case, and aside from finding some weird-looking country instruments in the hillbillies' rooms, there was nothing whatsoever. Sighing, I nonetheless kept on with my search and finally found one door that looked a little _different_ from the others.

For one thing, there was an almost life-sized poster of The Beetles on it, complete with copied pictures of all of their albums and a whole typed-up record of them as a band. Why didn't I spell it "B-E-_A_-T-L-E-S"? You're thinking in _human_ terms. This is _Muppetburg_. There was also a copy of the sheet music for Miss Piggy's number from the night before, "I'm Gonna Always Love You", lying crumpled up and half-burned just outside, something that did not fail to catch my attention. Kicking it scornfully out of my way, I knocked hesitantly on the door, then a little louder, but nobody answered. I quietly tried the handle, then started as it opened only very slowly and with a lot of effort on my part. It wasn't locked, but instead was _jammed_ somehow. Setting my eye against the keyhole (and half-expecting to see Miss Piggy staring back again), I saw that gum had been wadded up inside the hole to prevent any lockpicks or genuine keys from getting through. As I drew back, I also saw paper wadding wedged into the hinges so carefully that they weren't visible unless you were looking for them. Ingenious. The casual passerby would expect that the door was locked and move on, or they would just think that the door was stuck. Either way they'd get discouraged and leave. And that made me want more than ever to find out what was inside.

Very carefully I removed the paper wadding and gum and, when I was sure I'd gotten all of it out, I looked across the hall. No one coming in either direction. The hallway was deserted. Creaking the door open, I ventured inside.

Even in the dim lights I could immediately tell that this was Floyd's dressing room, because not only was the entire series of "Rolling Stones Magazine" littering the floor, there were at least fifteen guitars propped up against the back wall. No family pictures to be seen, but that was Floyd all right—ever the one who cast himself out. I glanced around, saw nothing else of note and shrugged. Floyd probably boarded up his room because he was paranoid that someone might steal his stuff. No need for further investigation.

I turned to leave, then something on the floor of the room caught my gaze. It was Floyd's suit jacket, the one he never wore, with the big shoulders and purple-and-red pinstripes. I sighed and reached to pick it up and at least hang it on a chair, but as I grabbed it something fell out of the chest pocket. Squinting in the darkness, I saw that it was a pack of matches, which was kind of weird because Floyd never smoked—through his mouth or any other point on his body. Turning it over carefully, I read "Mr. Bassman: For Unemployed Musicians", complete with an unlisted phone number and the address for a secret hideout. On instinct, I pocketed the matches. If The Electric Mayhem was as embroiled in this murder plot as I thought they were, it could be important evidence. Besides, I might want to pay this "Unemployed Musicians" place a visit.

Closing the door behind me, I carefully rejammed the door with the paper wadding and restuffed the lock. On the off chance that Floyd returned, he hopefully wouldn't have much to suspect...Except for the fact that I'd pocketed the mutilated sheet music too. But if he hated that music as much as I was sure he did, he would consider it a blessing if it was gone.

I went back into the central hallway, the one I'd entered from the side alley. Everything was as I had left it, and still no one paid me any heed. Starting, I realized that I still had to find Wayne and Wanda. I'd forgotten about them after entering Floyd's dressing room, but I needed to talk to them too. _And_ _Miss_ _Piggy_, I thought grudgingly. I wished I could've pinned the whole thing on the pig, if only for the simple fact that she inflamed hatred in me that I couldn't explain. _And_ that she thought my name was "Miss Salt". But I couldn't hang it on her, at least not without evidence.

Sighing heavily, I went to knock at some more dressing rooms when my eye caught sight of something I hadn't noticed before: a single, whitewashed door just off to the side of the hallway. There were no gold stars on it, or any other sort of decoration, so I figured that there must be some other kind of room behind it than a private one. Maybe Wayne and Wanda were in there. Testing the knob, I found it unlocked and walked right in.

All I took in at first was that this was most certainly a kitchen, because there were large pots and pans hanging up all around. The next split second all I could see was the resident chef of Uncle Henson's Theater, the incomprehensible Swedish character with thick eye-obscuring eyebrows and a big, russet mustache. But I didn't pay attention to any of these facts, because the moment I walked inside the chef raised a large musket at me, shouted "Yeer hoe!" and pulled the trigger.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**: "We're Coming Too!"

Only a desperate survival instinct allowed me to dodge in time, and as I ducked the bullet sailed over my head and through a soggy sphere of dough that had been falling from the ceiling just above me. I dove off to the side in case he fired again, but the chef actually looked _surprised_ by my appearance. He hefted the gun back into a straight-up-and-down position, scratching the head beneath his immense _torque-blanche_. "Yorn desh born dee poppity-poppity?" he asked as I cautiously stood back up. "Yersh dee bornen dee yorn der moo-fin," the chef continued, striding over and picking up the impaled dough. He stuck his finger through the hole. "See? Do-nut."

I was still very much in shock over my being shot at, so I had no idea what to say to this. Only by paying special attention could I interpret the chef as asking why I'd come in while he was shooting, and that he'd been aiming at the "muffin" to make it into a doughnut. I just stared wide-eyed at the musket in his hands, which prompted him to say, "Yorn du sverr de geurin, Mees Peeppers."

It surprised me that he had remembered my name, but I was so dazed over the whole thing that I just made my way out of there in no time flat without even thanking him for the apology. I was sure that my hair was standing straight up from the scare, and I was so bewildered that my first words when I ran into Wayne and Wanda in the hallway were, "Did you know that the chef has a _musket?_"

They just looked at me. "Of course!" Wayne exclaimed simply. "Why wouldn't he?"

———

**STATLER**: Yeah, why WOULDN'T he?

**WALDORF**: I dunno. I could never tell what he was saying.

**STATLER**: Maybe...maybe he's a SECRET AGENT from Sweden! He's trying to blend in with the culture by becoming a cook! And he has a musket—maybe HE'S the murderer! It must be some sort of secret Swedish plot to take over the government, starting with bumping off the eagle as a trial run! And then the Chef will kill the president and declare himself the dictator, and we'll all be forced to speak in that Swedish gibberish and EAT HIS COOKING!

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

**WALDORF**: If I was him, I'd start by taking over the Board of Health so I wouldn't be condemned for what I was cooking.

**STATLER**: Yeah...actually, that's more likely.

———

My head cleared at that point, and I was sensible enough to realize that I had now found Wayne and Wanda and I could get on with my interrogation. Adjusting the collar of my trenchcoat and smoothing my hair back down, I asked, "So...Wayne and Wanda. Where were you when I was looking for you?"

The two looked at each other excitedly. "Oh, WAYNE!" Wanda cried, before turning to me. "You really mean it? Are we going to be big stars?"

If the "Michelle Oznowicz" sequence hadn't occurred just recently, I would've been wondering what they were talking about. "Sorry, guys, I'm not a record-company person or anything," I explained, and their faces fell. "You should know me; you should certainly remember my voice from the telephone."

Wayne and Wanda exchanged inscrutable glances. "...Ms. Pepper?" Wayne finally ventured.

"In the skin," I replied. They glanced at each other again. They were certainly _looking_ guilty of something, and perhaps that "something" had to do with Sam...

"Wh-what're you doing here?" asked Wayne, his voice shaking notably. He was wearing a Napoleon-esque costume complete with a big blue general's hat, which surprisingly didn't do very much to lighten the mood. "You talked to us on the phone. I thought you'd heard all you needed to."

"Not quite." I decided to play it cool. Unlike one Eddie Valiant, I knew that if I came straight out with my questions they had a fair chance of lying. "Just a common courtesy call so you could explain your reasons for hanging up on me."

I had expected wild denials and hectic tale-weaving, but Wayne and Wanda got the drop on _me_ by playing it cool too. "That wasn't us," Wanda stated. "Gonzo just showed up out of nowhere and hung up the phone before beating on it with a baseball bat." She handed me a very dented, beaten-up piece of sports equipment to prove it. "Then he said something about 'leaving dangerous objects hanging around.' I dunno what it was all about."

OK, well, their story was more than likely if that had been The Great Gonzo who'd walked into the telephone after the Chief had left to get Wayne and Wanda. Come to think of it, that had sounded like his voice too. But their strange behavior had started _before_ that...maybe it was time for money talk again. "I just thought, after your reaction to my assumption of your higher salary—"

I was taken by surprise again as the two once more played it completely cool. "What reaction?" Wayne asked. He looked around at Wanda confusedly. "Wanda, did you notice a reaction when Ms. Pepper asked about our money situation?"

"No I didn't, Wayne," she replied, equally innocent. It sure didn't seem like a front to me, but then I was the one who had the penchant for misgauging clients' backgrounds and employment in a single glance. "I don't know what you're talking about, Ms. Pepper."

Inspiration hit me. "I'd like to see your money records, then," I shot back triumphantly. I had them now. If I could check their balance, I'd be able to tell where they were. They wouldn't have had time since my appearance to fabricate a fake record, so I'd know exactly why they were so dodgy about their financial situation with Sam! It was genius, I congratulated myself. Sheer wit, certain victory, all-encompassing—

"Er, Ms. Pepper," Wayne said hesitantly, "this is a Muppet establishment. We don't _keep_ bank records."

I blanked out for a moment before my heart dropped fifty feet. Dang it, it was true. I'd gotten so wrapped up in my theatrical last-minute-save act that I'd forgotten the things that differentiated Muppet communities and businesses from the rest of the world's. Of _course_ they didn't keep any sorts of records of their balances, Muppets always naturally trusted each other and everyone else! Whether on a subconscious level or not, every Muppet in existence always thought of everyone else to be as truthful as themselves. But then, with all this business of Sam's demise, and that only Muppets themselves know how to kill a Muppet...well, in this day and age, maybe some of the race had soured. The rest of the universe certainly had.

———

**STATLER**: Like US!

———

I was interrupted in the middle of my uncharacteristically philosophical thoughts by a tugging on my trenchcoat. I looked down, expecting with some nervousness to see Fozzie there again, but it was a chicken instead. It might have been the same chicken as before, but how could _I_ tell? They don't exactly wear _nametags_. It had part of my coat in its beak, and it was "brawk"ing past it at me urgently. I glanced at Wayne and Wanda, but they were just as in the dark as I was. I sighed. "Where's that 'Great Gonzo' when you need him?"

Just then, the character himself poked his head around an open door. "Hey, did somebody call?" he asked.

Wow, that was convenient. "Hey, uh, Mr. Gonzo—" I began, waving a hand at him.

"Aw," he insisted, venturing out into the hallway, "just call me 'Great'."

For my own dignity I ignored that remark. "Mr. Gonzo," I explained, "this chicken, here—" I broke off suddenly as I realized that the chicken had disappeared again. Well, not entirely. This time I at least saw it running down the hallway in the opposite direction. I turned back around as I heard Gonzo sigh.

"That was Camilla," he lamented. I noticed that he was wearing a purple tuxedo rather than his caped crusader getup of last night. "She's been avoiding me for weeks now, and she won't talk to me." Gonzo sighed, reminding me of a love-weary man I'd once known. His name to me had been "Dad".

"It looked like she had something important to say, though," Wanda interjected.

"Does it matter?" Gonzo replied woefully. He shook his head, sighing again. "She still won't come anywhere near me." Hanging his head, Gonzo started murmuring wistfully. "Camilla..."

Something clicked in my mind then, and I groaned. If she was avoiding Gonzo, and he was the only one who spoke chicken, I might never find out what this Camilla wanted to say. And you know how it is in all those movies, where it's always the one you think is just there to annoy you who has the important information you need to solve the case. Well, maybe I could take a night class in chicken. _Yeah,_ _and_ _maybe_ _the_ _clock_ _in_ _Movin'_ _Right_ _Along_ _will_ _display_ _the_ _right_ _time_, I thought sarcastically.

This was all too much for me to digest right now. I needed to go clear my head for a while. So I left Wayne and Wanda, who'd already wandered off anyways, and went to leave. But almost all the doors in this place were identical, so I couldn't tell where the door was to the alley I'd entered through. Turning around in confusion, I spotted Gonzo again—but this time he was holding a bouquet of flowers and a heart-shaped box of chocolates. _Who_ _could_ he _be_ _giving_ _them_ _to?_ I wondered confusedly. _Trying_ _to_ _make_ _up_ _with_ _Camilla?_ In answer to my unspoken query, the guy literally waltzed right up to a very large, star-covered door, knocked twice and breezed right in. That door...I recognized it. But what was Gonzo doing in _Miss_ _Piggy's_ dressing room? With all that romance-y stuff to boot? Coming back to Earth, I berated myself with a slap to the forehead. What was I doing, all of a sudden trying to meddle in people's love lives? It was none of my business, just as it had been none of _Floyd's_ business. If The Great Gonzo was courting Miss Piggy, that wasn't _my_ affair—either way the phrase could be construed. Reaching in my pocket for a piece of spare change (I couldn't illegally hack a pay phone with cops all around), I instead withdrew the matches I'd found in Floyd's room. I reread the name. "_Mr. Bassman:_ _For_ _Unemployed_ _Musicians_". I grinned sourly. I might just have something to do with my afternoon after all.

* * *

Before striking out to discover the location of Mr. Bassman, I headed back to the apartment for some supplies. If I had this place pegged correctly, they wouldn't let anyone in unless they were a musician—and a Muppet. That last part was a complication I was going to have to deal with, but I already had a semblance of a plot formulating in my brain. Now I just had to get home, and hope desperately that I hadn't actually gotten around to pawning my old acoustic guitar—it would be useful in the caper I was about to try and pull off. I considered calling _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ to inform Kermit and Fozzie about what I was doing, but I decided against it. For one thing I didn't want anyone to worry, for another thing I didn't want Foz to go outside anywhere without my supervision in case a cop was nearby, but most importantly I just didn't want to have to deal with Alice.

———

**STATLER**: Reason enough for anyone.

**WALDORF**: Huh? To do what?

**STATLER**: Look, if you're not going to pay attention to the story, you might as well stop reading it!

**WALDORF**: OK, if you say so...

. . . .

**STATLER**: Oh, get BACK here, you old fool! You can't let me suffer alone!!

———

I was just about halfway back to the flat when I realized that I was being followed. I could tell easily enough, considering I was a detective in _Muppetburg_, 'till now the safest, most law-abiding town in the world. But the sound of soft _flip-flopping_ and shuffling of two Muppets' feet, as well as some urgent hushes hissed from twenty feet or more back, and feeling like someone was ducking out of the way every time I glanced over my shoulder—well, it was more than enough for me. Of course Muppetburg's streets are always crowded, they could've been following _anybody_, but still...

At the first possible chance, I stopped at a corner and skirted in front of a gaggle of passing Whatnots into a blind alley. Pressing myself against the side that was invisible from the direction I'd been coming from, I held my breath and waited. Sure enough, two pairs of feet stopped right in front of the alley, like the owners had lost something. I began to wonder wildly how the movie detectives had always managed to overcome opposition for anything, then figured that in broad daylight in a Muppet town, a bluff would hopefully be enough. So as soon as I was sure I'd pinpointed the exact location of the owners of the feet, I reached out from the alley and snagged them off the streets and inside. "Reach for the floor," I commanded in a low voice, sticking my finger in the small of one of their backs and hoping whoever it was thought it was a gun, "I've got you covered."

"Don't shoot!" a familiar voice cried out hysterically. I blinked.

"Foz?" I squinted in the dim light of the alley, making out the shaking silhouette beside my erstwhile client. "Kermit?"

Kermit had raised his head and looked around at me, quivering slightly. "Ph-ph-Phyllis?"

Meanwhile, Fozzie was still panicking like there was no tomorrow. "I'm too young to die!" he wailed, covering his eyes with his hands. "I haven't even done my 'Good Grief, the Comedian's a Bear' routine! It's too soon, it's too soon!"

"Uh, Fozzie..." Kermit began, relaxing only a little after recognizing me. But to no avail.

"I have to perform with Peter Sellers!" the bear was bemoaning, rather a bit too loudly for comfort. "And Avery Schrieber! And Peter Ustinov! Oh, I haven't even ever gotten _back_ at those two old hecklers from the Theater!"

———

**WALDORF**: Look at us, we're famous!

**STATLER**: Yeah, but I was thinking...maybe we should stop heckling that guy.

**WALDORF**: What, and leave show business?

———

"_Fozzie_..." Kermit tried again, a little louder.

"And what about Bruce Forsythe? I've always wanted to perform with him since...since...since..." His internal processors had apparently had a spontaneous combustion. "Hey, who the heck is Bruce Forsythe anyways?"

It became one of those rare times when Kermit ever really raised his voice. "_FOZZIE,_ _WILL_ _YOU_ _JUST_ _SHUT_ _UP_ _AND_ _LISTEN?_"

Immediately Fozzie stopped his jabbering, seeming to shrink almost to the ground and grabbed at the hem of Kermit's coat. "Oh, Kermit, froggy, sir, please don't—" In a split second he recognized me, and said, quite impressively I might add, "Uh-oh."

"That's not the half of it," I replied. Fozzie took off his bowler hat and held it in his hands, looking just the _smallest_ bit frightened. I bent down to their level and narrowed my eyes. "Why were you following me?"

"It was his idea!" both of them replied at once, each pointing at the other. Then they got into a discussion over that, how it wasn't them but the other, which eventually ended up with both of them fed up with the whole thing. Finally, Kermit sighed and explained, "We were worried that you were going to go off and do something dangerous without telling us—"

"So you decided to join in for the ride?" I cut in sarcastically.

Fozzie, for some inexplicable reason, had just very quietly traded in his bowler for the little "Press"-sticker hat that Kermit had—while Kermit was still _wearing_ it. Kermit hadn't even noticed. "Phyllis," Kermit insisted, his thin voice stretching into what was unmistakably his annoyed tones, "like it or not, we were _worried_ about you. So—so stop pretending to be a lone wolf and _accept_ it!"

I was taken aback by the ferocity of his statement, as well as the fact that he had actually thought that way. I realized, though, that it was kind of true—I was never really used to people being concerned about me, so of _course_ I didn't act like I thought every one of my foolhardy actions mattered to someone else. But I was trying to keep them _safe_ by _not_ telling them, so they _wouldn't_ go after me. It was a Muppet tendency to care, I knew that, but I didn't think that it might apply to them caring about _me_ as well. _Floyd_ certainly had never really showed that sort of affection, aside from cracking a smile at the troubles I had...and he was my _cousin_. Maybe...

"A 'lone wolf', Kermit?" Fozzie cracked with a huge smile. "But Phyllis is a _human_. How can she be a _wolf?_"

Rolling his froggy eyes, Kermit responded in the only way the situation allowed. "If she chased men all the time, she could be!"

That routine completely shattered the moment, but I wasn't complaining. All this philosophical thinking I was doing lately was giving me a headache. Seeing an opportunity, I tried futilely to see if I could circumvent them without their noticing so I could make my getaway. It didn't work.

"Phyllis," Kermit stated, his expression more set than it had ever been since I'd met him, "tell us where you're going. And then we're going with you."

"You can't—" I protested, but Kermit stopped me.

"Even if you tie us up," he proclaimed, his voice quivering a little in his determination, "we'll follow you. Because if you're going to risk your life, then we want the chance to possibly save it. No matter _what_."

I didn't know what to say to this. I mean, what _would_ you say? When a Muppet—or in fact, _anyone_—says that sort of thing to you, just what _is_ there to say in response? So I stood there, speechless, my breathing halted, my heart racing a mile a minute. I didn't want them to come with me on this sort of a mission, in case the police picked Foz up. But I didn't want to tell them that, in case they thought that I didn't care that _they_ cared. ...If that last sentence made any sense. So I just sighed, and pulled out the matches. "I found these in Floyd's dressing room," I explained. Fozzie was looking at them interestedly—a bit _too_ interestedly. I guess _he_ wasn't related to Smokey. Kermit took the matches and inspected the packet.

"...'Mr. Bassman: For Unemployed Musicians'...?" he asked quizzically, looking back up at me.

Fozzie surprised us all by interjecting a comment. "Hey, I've heard of that!" he exclaimed, snatching the packet away from Kermit so he could see them himself. I looked at him in shock. "_Yeah!_" Foz continued. "This is that place that my ma told me about, and said '_If_ _you_ _have_ _to_ _go_ _there,_ _you're_ _better_ _off_ _not_ _being_ _a_ _musician_'. I always wondered what she meant."

His words confused me. "What does that _mean_, though?" I asked. "Why would you rather give up music than go there?"

Fozzie thought long and hard about that for a moment, something that probably strained his cerebrum, then perked up again. Kermit _still_ hadn't noticed that Fozzie was wearing his "Press" hat, nor that _he_ was wearing Fozzie's bowler. "Well," Foz began, scratching his head, "Mom always said that if I had to go for some sort of home for out-of-work musicians, then that was an...I think she said, '_an_ _obvious_ _statement_ _of_ _my_ _tal-ent_ _and_ _mor-als_'," he finished, splitting the words "talent" and "morals" into individual syllables. He shrugged. "I didn't always understand Mom, but she was the _greatest_."

Then Mr. Bassman must have been like an illegal place for musicians who didn't make the cut, who, in other words, might not be very adept at their instruments. So what was _Floyd_, an _amazing_ guitarist, doing _there?_ Unless Sam wasn't giving him a steady enough paycheck to let him go anywhere else. But there might be something else to look up at this place...and I knew Kermit and Fozzie wouldn't let me go there alone, whether they were next to me or shadowing me. I sighed. "Are you guys _sure_ that you don't want to stay home? It might be dangerous coming with me."

Both of them were set in their determination, even though their knees were knocking. "Phyllis," Fozzie stuck in, stuttering a little, "whether there's a rubber chicken or a knife in a bad guy's hand, I'm going with you."

"And I'm going too," Kermit proclaimed.

I stood stock-still for a moment, then—"All right," I exhaled, giving in. "As long as you don't mind getting your musical talent ridiculed."

Happy triumph colored Kermit's grin that shade of green that I envied he could achieve. Fozzie was also ecstatic, but I can't imagine that he could possibly have had a full grip on the danger in it. "But we'll have to head to the apartment first," I cut in. "Kermit, you still have that banjo, right?"

"Of course!" he replied. A faraway look invaded his eyes. "Oh, it's going to be great just _using_ that thing again. It was a gift from my parents, back when we lived in the swamp. I wrote a lot of songs on that instrument..."

"You wrote songs?" I asked, incredulous. I'd never known that before.

"Yeah." His eyes were glazing over. "I submitted one to the paper, once. That's how I got my job at _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_. It was a piece called 'The Rainbow Connection'." He started humming a few bars, then shook his head. "But now I have no time to play that banjo."

A remembrance jolted me. "_The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_?" I cried, snapping Kermit out of his sorrows. In my alarm I grabbed Kermit by the jacket. "Are you _crazy?_ Your job! How'd you get out without being caught, or did you somehow manage to hypnotize your editor into letting you leave?"

Kermit seemed shaken, but I would be too if someone suddenly hauled _me_ up a couple feet into the air and started yelling at me. "I told Mr. Zealand that it was 'field research'," Kermit explained awkwardly. "As long as I have an article for him, he won't argue."

All of a sudden Fozzie interrupted us. "Come on, let's go!" he called out, already starting to jog down the street towards the apartment. At first I just watched him going, then after I remembered to put Kermit down we ran after him.

"He's a pretty good bear," I commented. "Not that I'd tell him in so many words."

"Yeah," Kermit returned, then suddenly cried, "Hey, you give me back that hat!" before taking off down the street after Foz, who sped up, both of them laughing all the way.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**: The Sewer Community

It was a hard trek to Mr. Bassman's, especially when I had to always wait up for Kermit and Fozzie. Wearing dark sunglasses that Fozzie had just _happened_ to have on him, Kermit had rustled up an old zoot suit from our meager closet, which Fozzie was wearing. Kermit had on a sleeveless, white t-shirt and shorts, and he had also managed to attach a fake hairy beard to his chin, a feat I deemed worthy of an Academy Award considering that he made it look natural. Foz had a wide, pinstriped, _proper_ tie on, which clashed almost blindingly with his stripy suit coat. For his instrument, he had—wait for it—a _kazoo_. I had no idea how we were going to pass inspection at Mr. Bassman's with _that_, but it was better than him _not_ having an instrument. As for me...every visible scrap of my skin had been covered up with some article of clothing. I had on heavy gardener's gloves, coupled with a gray Homburg hat, a collared-up blue suit coat, a sort of neckerchief covering my mouth and nose plus sunglasses with gigantic lenses that covered the upper half of my face. Aside from the overall "concealed" look, you would have a hard time telling whether I was a Muppet or not. I hoped. Kermit's banjo was slung across his back haphazardly, and my acoustic guitar was carried very carefully with the neck in one hand. I had no idea whether it would be tuned or not, or even whether the strings were still _intact_, but at least I still had it. _That_ was an accomplishment in itself. I had been sure that it was in hock in some pawn shop somewhere in the human cities racking up a heck of a bill, but it was still there in the flat and preserved as well as possible from when I'd first received it—I was still getting an _allowance_ in those years. I hoped I still remembered at least one of the chords, or else Kermit would probably never speak to me again. He was the resident music-lover, after all.

———

**WALDORF**: That was a LONG paragraph.

**STATLER**: Think that's long? Try looking at the rest of this STORY!

**WALDORF**: What? Why?

**STATLER**: There're still 14 chapters to go, PLUS an epilogue!

**WALDORF**: What've we gotten ourselves INTO?!

**STATLER**: Well, we can't get OUT of it.

**WALDORF**: We can't?

**STATLER**: Nope...these chains are REALLY tough,

**WALDORF**: So much for getting a rat to chew through them, huh?

**RIZZO**: Hey fellas, do you MIND? Cheez Louise!

———

After much journeying through muck and back alleys, we eventually got to the riverfront where the so-called "address" from the matches was located. It was a pretty enough place, but we weren't interested in looks right now. Besides, halfway down the river the property hit an outdated sewer system though thankfully _that_ hadn't been running for several years. I glanced back down at the match packet, carefully lifting up my huge sunglasses to do so. My hopes sunk as I realized the match-up between the two locations. "Get on your rain gear, boys," I muttered through the neckerchief, "it's into the sewer."

"YUCK," Fozzie sputtered once we'd clambered in, and I was set to agree with him. Though the sludge was mostly dry, the moisture from the proximity of the river was more than enough persuasion to get some mold to move in for the real estate. Trying very hard not to touch the walls, we crawled slowly through the level tunnel and attempted without much success to not think about what we were actually crawling through, even if it _was_ many years old.

"Are you sorry you came _now?_" I asked Kermit, which was a safe enough maneuver considering Fozzie was several feet ahead of us.

His obstinate stick-to-itiveness still held even though he found himself speaking through false whiskers. "You won't get us to turn around," he insisted before shifting sharply to stop his uncovered banjo from slipping off his back.

"Not with Fozzie thinking it's the greatest thing ever," I added to him under my breath, and we kept crawling.

It wasn't very long after that that I heard Foz call back, "Hey, the tunnel's wider up here! I can stand up now!" Hurrying on, Kermit and I caught up to him, and saw that Fozzie had told the truth—the passageway opened right up into an immense cavern, dimly lit and obviously man-made—or, well, Muppet-made. It looked like a chamber that had been part of the sewer system, but with small shafts of sunlight poking through at odd angles from the tall ceiling. I chanced a quick lifting of my sunglasses so I could have an unfiltered view, and I was taken aback by the multitude of dirty, cigarette-smoking, miserable-looking musician Muppets. Though there was no water running to speak of, the atmosphere was dampened by the absence of happiness. It wasn't _sad_, exactly, but just...look, they weren't really throwing any wild parties in there or anything.

"Wocka wocka," Fozzie breathed, and though I couldn't really determine the emotion behind it, I had to heartily agree. It was like a musician _underworld_. I didn't think that in a Muppet town there _was_ such a thing as underground poverty, or speakeasies, or anything _this_...low and scummy. I guess we all have to learn that the happy, pretty atmosphere that goes out on Kodak commercials isn't always the only viewpoint to a situation.

Unslinging his banjo from his shoulders, Kermit ventured further into the cavern. "I guess this is the place," he stated before a large figure stepped out from around the corner from the tunnel and blocked our way. I jumped, and both my companions followed suit.

"Can't come any farther," the Muppet grunted, and we all had to look upwards to see his face—even me. The newcomer was around seven feet tall, with purple fuzzy skin and a shock of orange hair. He had on a pair of brown painters' overalls and an innocent-looking newsboy cap, but the large, pointed teeth sticking out of his jaws didn't bode too well to me. He glared down at us. "Who're you?"

Kermit responded before I had a chance to. "We're tired, hungry and poor," he insisted, and I agreed with him to every extent. Digging through his pockets, he produced the matchbook that had given me the directions here. "A friend told us about this place, and we're chancin' it to the fullest." I was impressed that Kermit came off so well as an unemployed musician; I hadn't thought he had it in him.

The tall guy took the matches, which seemed microscopic in his hands, and looked it over. "So you've heard about our nightclub," he grunted. I blinked. _Nightclub?_

Fozzie voiced my thought. "Nightclub?" he asked, bewildered. Then with a flourish, he tried his hand at imitating jazz lingo. "I mean," he proclaimed, sounding like he was reading lines off a cue card, " 'What joint does ya mean, pelvis-cat?' "

"Mr. Bassman, of course," the big guy retorted, sounding like it was the most obvious thing in the world. I thanked whoever might be listening that he hadn't picked up on Fozzie's false musician-dialect. "I mean, that's just the 'talent show' part of this place, where everyone shows off their ability," he went on. "There's so much more; in fact, there's—"

Just as my hopes were growing, the stranger broke off. "Hey, _wait_ a minute," he growled. "How do I know you're not cops? And what's with _that_ guy"—he pointed right at me—"and the wacky get-up? Sounds fishy to me."

I hadn't been prepared for either of those questions, but I ad-libbed as best I could for the one I was sure I _would_ be able to answer. "Fur condition," I lied, scratching one of my arms through the coat as a sort of alibi. "I have to keep it covered up at all times or it'll shrivel up and crack. The doctors called it 'Toast syndrome'." The ailment, at least, was a real one; I don't live with a frog who hears all the news for _nothing_. I left it up to Kermit to answer the other one, because I myself had _no_ idea how we were going to convince the big guy that we weren't police officers.

After scratching his "beard", Kermit looked up at our inspector determinedly. "If you don't believe that we're out-of-work musicians," he proposed, "then we'll play something for you."

———

**STATLER**: Oh no, Muppet music!

**WALDORF**: AHHH! The scourge of the recording room!

**STATLER** **AND WALDORF**: SOMEBODY HELP US!

———

The answer Kermit gave was short and simple and might actually get us out of this jam, but his suggestion sent my lungs right down into my stomach. I had forgotten everything I ever knew about the guitar when I'd gotten sick of practicing. What was Kermit thinking? Or—the possibility made me freeze up—had I never told him that I didn't remember how to play?

Perhaps sensing my nervousness, Kermit turned around to look at me. "Just stay calm," he hissed, to Fozzie too, "and follow my lead."

Kermit started playing an even cadence on his banjo, playing the same set of notes over in even time. I picked up my guitar and imitated him, picking out a few random strings and strumming them to the same beat. Fozzie accompanied on kazoo while Kermit started singing the first lines, slowly and almost as if he was still just talking.

"_It_ _starts_ _when_ _we're_ _kids—  
__A_ _show-off_ _in_ _school_.  
_Making_ _faces_ _at_ _friends,  
__You're_ _a_ _clown_ _and_ _a_ _fool_..._"_

The tempo picked up immediately after that as Kermit's chords got more complicated, intertwining as more of a melody than the earlier simple cadence. I tried my best to keep up, wildly guessing at which strings I should pluck and, amazingly, getting a decent blend. Fozzie's kazoo unexpectedly seemed to have a wide range of notes, which he was playing to the fullest, looking more like he was playing a sophisticated instrument than a kid's toy. Kermit went on, his lyrics taking the same turns as the new tune.

"_Doin'_ _pratfalls_ _and_ _birdcalls_ _and_ _bad_ _imitations  
__Ignoring_ _your_ _homework—  
__Is_ _that_ _dedication?  
__You_ _work_ _to_ _the_ _mirror:"_

A brief, uplifting chord.

"_You're_ _getting_ _standing_ _ovations_..._"_

Suddenly, unexpectedly, Fozzie added his two cents to the song.

"_You're_ _burning_ _with_ _hope_..._"_

For lack of anything else constructive to do, I chorused with him on the next lines. By an unbelievable coincidence, we sang the same exact words, without any prior knowledge of what the other was going to sing.

"_You're_ _building_ _up_ _steam_...  
_What_ _was_ _once_ _juvenilish—"_

Fozzie dropped out, leaving me to solo the next line.

"—_Is_ _grown-up_ _and_ _STYLISH!"_

Kermit rejoined the chorus, and we all sang the next line, Kermit's banjo thankfully drowning out my confused guitar picking.

"_You're_ _close_ _to_ _your_ _dream!"_

We were in the home stretch now. I think at that moment we were all psychically connected, because we _were_ all singing the same thing, word-for-word.

"_Then_ _somebody_ _out_ _there_ _loves_ _you,  
__Stands_ _up_ _and—"_

Just when I'd started to get used to it, our inspector silenced us by clapping his hands over his ears and shouting, "OK! Enough!" Shaking his head and pulling out a clipboard, I'm pretty sure I heard him mutter "_Definitely_ unemployed musicians" before raising his voice again to speak to us. "All right then, I believe you." He pulled a pen out of the chest pocket of his overalls. "State your names and business."

Names. I hadn't thought of _that_ either. By now I was really glad that Kermit and Fozzie had come along, because Kermit immediately offered up, "I'm Rufus T. Firefly, and the bear over there is my assistant Emmanuel Ravelli. And that's our associate J. Cheever Loophole, the one with the fur condition."

The big guy started to write those down, then paused with the pen quivering over the paper. "Wait a second," he growled suspiciously. "Didn't you say before that you were Tired, Hungry and Poor?"

"As a description, _yes_," Kermit explained patiently. "But our names are Firefly, Ravelli and Loophole."

"Rufus T. Firefly, Emmanuel Ravelli, J. Cheever Loophole," the big guy muttered, getting set to jot them down again, but he paused once more. "Haven't I heard those names somewhere before?"

It was my turn to come up with an amazing save. "If you have, then that's proof of our status as musicians," I insisted. "We used to perform here and there, so we might've gotten in the papers at some point."

Hesitating a little, he nevertheless shrugged and jotted it all down. I had to suppress a sigh of relief. Thankfully, prejudiced Muppets wouldn't have any use remembering the Marx Brothers' various aliases from their movies. As for us, well, Kermit and I had always watched the marathons whenever one of our four basic channels ran them. Who ever thought that culture could change your life?

———

**WALDORF**: I didn't.

**STATLER**: But culture changed OUR lives.

**WALDORF**: ?

**STATLER**: Yeah. THE MUPPET SHOW is what roped us into heckling the Muppets every waking moment of our lives!

**WALDORF**: Well, what were the sort of things we used to do BEFORE we started heckling them?

**STATLER**: Heckling each other.

———

Fozzie started to proudly stride into the cavern, but was stopped once more by our interrogator. "What's your business here, then?" he asked.

On a sudden inspiration, I stuck my hand in my pants pocket and pulled out the mutilated sheet music I'd picked up outside Floyd's dressing room—when getting in disguise, I hadn't acquired another pair of pants. I showed the decrepit paper to the big guy. "We were looking for someone who might help us repair the destroyed measures," I explained.

He winced when he saw the condition the paper was in. Taking it gingerly by an unburnt end, he turned the sheet this way and that, reading the title aloud. " 'I'm Gonna Always Love You', by Jeff Moss for Miss Piggy?" I saw Kermit look up in surprise at the name. The big guy hummed some of the music aloud, then shook his head in distaste. "If I were you I wouldn't care about restoring _this_ piece of trash, but that's your worry," he grumbled. Handing me the sheet music back, he instructed, "Look, unless you register at The Happiness Hotel, you're going to have to leave here at midnight. Policy, you know." Waving us through, he added, "Now get going before I hangs ya' upside-down!"

As we scurried to get out of his sight, Kermit looked up at me. "Miss Piggy?" he inquired almost breathlessly. "Do you have the music to Miss Piggy's number?"

Hearing Kermit talk about the porcine diva with that faraway look he usually reserved for his banjo, I instantly remembered exactly why I'd hated Miss Piggy so thoroughly. Trying to control my sudden burst of jealousy, I explained, "I found it outside Floyd's dressing room, torched up and wrecked."

"May I see it?"

Fozzie was looking at me anxiously as I tried to think up an excuse to not give it to Kermit, but I eventually had to give in and handed him the sheet. Foz looked over Kermit's shoulder, then had a double-take as he saw the title of the piece.

"Whoa, that really _is_ Miss Piggy's music!" he blurted, forcibly tearing it away from Kermit and scanning it with his eyes. "It's the one from last night!" Fozzie looked up at me suddenly. "Why'd you keep it?"

I fought for an answer. _So_ _I_ _could_ _torch_ _and_ _burn_ _it_ _some_ _more,_ I thought internally, but no way I was going to let that reaction show. "...I guess I thought it might be evidence," I replied lamely.

"PHEW!" Fozzie sounded extremely relieved. "For a second I thought you were going to say that you liked her act!"

A surge of bitter gratitude went out from me to Foz for that one instant. So I wasn't alone in my loathing of the pig. Kermit, however, just made his usual frown and stuck the music in his pocket instead. "I happened to enjoy it," he answered stiffly, and I got the sinking feeling that he was going to be in a bad mood for the rest of the day.

In an attempt to change the subject, I brought up our mission. "OK," I muttered in a low voice so we wouldn't be overheard, "Remember, we've got to investigate and keep our eyes open for clues to the mur—" A passing trumpet player, a yellow Muppet with perpetually-closed eyes and a wild head of bright canary-colored hair, was looking at us. "—to the _you-know-what_."

Fozzie, looking around through his big sunglasses, hissed back, "How're we going to do that, Phyllis?"

I motioned for them to start walking, as three musicians standing whispering in the middle of a cavern in a disused sewer system would look suspicious. ...But seeing as _everyone_ here was in a cavern in a disused sewer system, I guess I'll revise that and say that we'd better keep moving or we'd seem conspicuous. While we walked and waved to various other down-on-their-luck musicians (none of whom waved back, I might add), I whispered, "That starts with Floyd. If he had a match packet from Mr. Bassman's, then that means he definitely has some connection there. Now, if we could just find somewhere he stayed..."

"The big guy over there mentioned a 'Happiness Hotel'," Kermit offered up. "That could be a start. If we could get a look at the names of the tenants, we could find out a lot."

"Good thinking." The gears in my brain were whirling, clicking all the information we had into place. "We'll have to check there too. Does anyone know what time it is?"

"Five-thirty," Fozzie answered suddenly, and we looked at him a little funny.

"And how would you happen to know _that_?" Kermit demanded .

"_Well_," the bear began, as if he'd had this whole bit memorized and only now had a chance to use it, "There was this one time, see, where I was trapped in this pit in the middle of my living room—this was when I was still living with Mom—and then out of _nowhere_—"

"We get it, Fozzie," Kermit and I insisted forcefully at the same time, and it took all I had to stifle a series of laughs. I may not know much about art, but I know what I like.

And that seemed to involve looking for evidence that could hang a murder on my cousin.

———

**WALDORF**: You know, that "toast" thing the detective lady was talking about is a true occurrence.

**STATLER**: That's right. When a Muppet gets old and crusty enough that no one uses it anymore, its skin DOES turn into what the Muppet engineer people call "toast".

**WALDORF**: Then how come it hasn't happened to YOU yet? Heh heh heh!

WHUMPHF.

**STATLER**: Well, that was the educational part of the book.

**WALDORF**: Yeah, there you go, right there!

**STATLER**: Put this story down and get a job!

**WALDORF**: Yeah, you don't want to end up heckling Muppets all your life like us!

**STATLER**: Or reading pointless stories about copyrighted characters! Get a life! Go do something intelligent!

**WALDORF**: Take us with you!

**STATLER**: Just get us away from this awful story!

. . . . . . . . .

**WALDORF**: Looks like we're stuck here. No one wants to give us a lift.

**STATLER**: Sixteen-year-old roadhogs!

**WALDORF**: Can't be trusted with a license anyways!

**STATLER**: I hope gas goes up to twenty bucks a gallon! Cheapskates!

**WALDORF**: Boo!

———

_A/N: The song "The Magic Store", featured in this chapter, was written by Paul Williams and Kenny Ascher and initially appeared in _The Muppet Movie_. The lyrics were obtained from "The Muppets 25th Anniversary CD: Music, Mayhem and More"._


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**: Checking In and Checking Things Out

I had known when I'd spotted the sewer opening that our Mr. Bassman would lead us into a broken-down old plumbing system, but I had had no idea that there would be actual _buildings_ down here. It was like the city streets of Muppetburg, except filled with stoned musicians and not quite as pleasant or noisy. Sure, there was also a good few inches of water to wade through to get past certain places, but in Muppetburg there was always the distressingly common occurrence of someone's dripping faucet upgrading into a mind-numbing catastrophe, so it wasn't really all _that_ different.

As I was saying, though, there were all sorts of architectural structures down here, and even though they weren't exactly Taj Mahals they would still pass the lenient-but-functional building codes in the city above. If it hadn't been for the bland cement walls and the only light coming from bonfires and the odd sun-glare from the slits in the cavern ceiling, I'd have sworn that I was aboveground in a _legal_ community.

Soon enough, we reached a dilapidated shack against the "sidewalk" in one of the off-branches of the system. The shack itself we would've passed by, except for the single, messily-scrawled wooden sign on the door:

"_Mr. Bassman : For Unemployed Musicians_"

"This is the place," I mumbled through my neckerchief as Kermit pushed the door open and we entered.

The place was obviously trying to emulate Uncle Henson's Theater, because the interior looked remarkably similar until my eyes adjusted. The clock was the same style, the tables were all set up the same, the patched and faded curtain was hanging at the same angle as the one in the Theater had been, but...the silverware was missing, there was no multitude of people scurrying around and, most important of all, it was much smaller. Not to mention, though, that there were no minions of the law snooping around trying to find a comedian bear accused of murder.

As we entered, a small, sticklike character with bug eyes and a red thatch of hair looked up at us from a podium in front of the hat-check. "Hey man, we don't open for a while, okay?" he grumbled, waving four arms at us to try to shoo us out. His pastel windbreaker seemed out of place considering the slightly more "hip" outfits the other musicians had been wearing.

"Um, we're actually looking for information," Kermit cut in. Fozzie nodded enthusiastically. I, meanwhile, was caught up in trying to figure out exactly _what_ type of Muppet our "host" was. I was guessing "shrimp".

"Then try '411'!" the little character shot back irritably. "Pépe doesn't have time to hang around answering questions." He scratched his head with one of his spare arms, taking out a magazine and flipping through it. It was titled _Playprawn_. I didn't think I wanted to know what was in there. I motioned Kermit and Fozzie away from the hat-check, and we huddled in a corner away from "Pépe".

"Do either of you have any money with you?" I hissed.

Kermit looked at me blankly. "What do _you_ think?"

"No, huh?" Fozzie went on, drooping a little at the ears. I knew that I didn't have any cash either, which made me even more annoyed. I should've expected something like _this_ to happen.

"All right," I tried again, shooting a glance over my shoulder to see if Pépe was eavesdropping. But he seemed quite contented with looking through the magazine and grinning wickedly. "Do either of you have _anything_ we could bribe that guy with?" I started, "And _don't_ say 'dirty magazines' or expect a horrible death."

Kermit didn't even check his pockets before shaking his head. I rummaged through my suit and then my pants pockets, coming up with nothing but lint. I sighed and resigned myself to the inevitable: we'd have to find some other way to get the scoop from this Pépe. But how? I mean, there was no way in _heck_ that I could use any sorts of "feminine charms", and if we beat him up then we wouldn't be able to get the information from him! Maybe if we had...

"Oh oh oh, _I_ got something!" Fozzie blurted, startling me. Digging through the inside pocket of his zoot suit, Foz suddenly pulled out a _whoopee cushion_. I looked at Kermit confusedly. Had he known that there was a whoopee cushion in the pocket of his vintage suit?

"Um, Foz," I started hesitantly, "I _don't_ think we can—"

Kermit nudged me before I could get any more than that out. "Why not, Phyllis?" he suggested, much to my further surprise. I'd have thought that he would be the first _against_ the idea. "We'll never know until we've tried."

Freezing in contemplation for a split second, I caved in. "All right, we'll try it," I sighed, "but I won't guarantee anything."

Feeling like a complete moron, I sauntered back over to Pépe with our bribe material, followed close behind by Fozzie and Kermit. I coughed to get his attention, and the little guy rolled his eyes and sighed exasperatedly before putting down his magazine. "Okay man, I told you to leave," he demanded. "I said we're not open! So amscray!!"

Looking around and flushing as red as I'd ever been (_including_ while being taunted by Floyd), I passed him the whoopee cushion as if on the sly. "This convince you?" I muttered, peeking at him out of the corner of my sunglasses.

First I saw Pépe's eyes widen, then his jaw fell open and he dropped _Playprawn_. Glancing almost guiltily at the magazine as it lay open on his podium, I realized he'd been looking at a picture spread of prawn in bathing suits. I didn't even know that Muppetburg _had_ those kinds of specialty magazines! ...But with the species diversity of Muppets, well, it seemed kind of unavoidable.

"Hey, man," Pépe breathed as he took the whoopee cushion, "you must _really_ want that information!" Then, tucking his new prize into a drawer in the podium, he straightened up and asked, "So, what do you want to know, okay?"

Kermit and Fozzie looked to me to offer the questions, but I myself was so shocked that the whoopee cushion had been an acceptable bribe that I was completely shot for words. So Kermit started off. "We'd like to know whether you've noticed anything weird happening around here recently."

The shrimp launched into his response immediately and with a lot of fervor. "_Well_," he started, "you know the bathrooms here, they're not so awesome. But the other day there was some stuff floatin' in there that was just _not_ so good, man, and you know when I tried to go and clean it up, okay, it just kinda went _flat_, and then—"

I tried to suppress a violent allergic reaction to his words, and I could see Fozzie looking around nervously, as if afraid of either leaving or continuing to listen. Kermit looked just as sick to his stomach as I felt, and if he hadn't been that color to start with he surely would've turned a bright plant green right there. Swallowing a disgusted retch, I spluttered, "Um...on second thought, how about weird things that the _musicians_ have been doing?"

———

**WALDORF**: They're MUSICIANS! What do they do that ISN'T weird?

**STATLER** **AND WALDORF**: OHOHOHOHO!

———

"Oh, _that?_" Pépe sulked, disappointed. But with an overly-dramatic sigh and a flattening down of some of his more errant hairs, he went on, "Okay, so...who you want to hear about, s'okay? The Clodhoppers? Nigel the put-upon conductor? Marvin Suggs? The Mutations?—the bouncer's part of _that_ group, you know—"

"Try," I interrupted, leaning in towards the shrimp, "Sergeant Floyd Pepper and The Electric Mayhem."

At the sound of those names, Pépe's demeanor changed like lightning. He morphed instantly from cool and laid-back to frantic and trembling. "Why do you wanna hear about them?" he flustered, blanching and sinking below the podium. "Oh, they're boring, s'okay? Nigel, on the other hand, ohhh, his wife is—"

"We're looking for stuff about Floyd," Fozzie asserted, taking off his hat and holding it to his chest. I was glad to see that he hadn't yet panicked enough to loose some information on why _we_ were here. The last thing I needed was to be tied up and eaten so I wouldn't disclose anything to the authorities.

"You guys are cops, right, s'okay?" the shrimp stammered frightfully. "You are, that's why you're looking for those guys—"

Kermit piped up, thinking faster and more logically than I could have. "If we're cops, then how could we have passed muster at the door?" he countered, then unslung his banjo. "We could play for you as proof—"

Pépe came enough back into himself to flat-out refuse. "No way, okay! I have heard unemployed musicians before, and it is _not_ so pretty, s'okay."

"Why won't you tell us about Floyd?" I demanded.

"Look," the shrimp stated plainly, "I don't wanna get arrested or nothin', s'okay? If you want to find out, you're gonna have to pay a _lot_ more than just one whoopee cushion." With an air of frightened but irreversible finality, he took out a sign that read "Closed" and placed it on top of his podium. "Now get out before I get Mr. Mutation!"

"But—" I protested. "But—"

Pépe looked up from his magazine and glanced around me. "And a very nice one too, but I'm not gonna talk, okay."

He couldn't stop that easily! I had to know what was going on! Why wasn't he telling me about Cousin Floyd? I was tempted to resort to actual violence, or at least take out another bribe, but Fozzie tugged on my sleeve and I looked down.

"It's not worth it," Kermit told me.

I tried to protest some more, but it became evident that Pépe wasn't going to be cajoled out of anything and we skedaddled our way out of there. Once we were outside, Fozzie exhaled in amazement. "More than a _whoopee_ _cushion?_" he speculated. "Whoa, that must be something _pretty_ _big_ going on!"

I reluctantly agreed. Every moment of this investigation made me feel even more that Floyd wasn't simply the breezy, down-on-his-luck musician I'd always pictured him to be. Now it seemed that he might be involved in illegal activity as well, which might just add up to him having killed Sam. Did I know my cousin at _all?_

"There's always The Happiness Hotel to look at," Kermit reminded me, seeming to realize my depression. "Innocent until proven guilty, right?"

"The Happiness Hotel, then," I assented, trying to smile at least a little. But through the neckerchief, I kind of doubted that they'd be able to see it.

* * *

It wouldn't have taken long to reach the Hotel, as it was practically next door to Mr. Bassman. But we didn't_ realize_ that when we left the dilapidated nightclub, so we took a rather circuitous route looking for it before Fozzie directed us around a wrong turn that led us back to Mr. Bassman and, to our embarrassment, The Happiness Hotel. I was unable to tell whether Foz's wrong turn was on purpose or a pure coincidence, but I knew that if I asked him he'd either just say "Huh?" or go on a long-winded explanation, so I let it lie.

Pushing open the doors, we entered the musty hotel. It was very old-looking, even more so than Movin' Right Along, though there was a distinct resemblance there. A faded, patched British flag hung over the check-in desk, and the wooden slats in the stairs seemed brittle enough that they'd snap if you so much as looked at them. It was just as empty as Mr. Bassman had been, and there was even a surrogate Pépe at the desk. It was an old Muppet, humanoid and balding with a pea-green nose and spectacles. He had on the closest thing to formal attire that I had seen in the entire trip down here, a button-down shirt and a suit vest. But he was acting far from formal—he was asleep.

We hesitantly approached the desk, and as though sensing our presence "Pops" lifted his head. "Huh?" he asked, blinking somewhat. His eyes were squinty behind his glasses. He sat up a little more.

"Um..." Kermit looked around at me and Foz like he was trying to see if it was OK for him to talk. Turning back to Pops, he said, "Uh, we'd like a room, please."

The old coot leaned forward, squinting some. "What?"

"We'd like to check in," Fozzie inserted.

Pops seemed rather taken aback, or at least a _little_ dazzled. Then, turning around to look up at the landing on the stairs directly behind him, he called, "Hey, somebody's checking in!"

The landing filled up automatically with various Muppets, most with an instrument of some kind. They all looked from one to the other amazedly. "Somebody's checkin' _in?_" asked one, a sunglasses-wearing humanoid with bright orange hair and mustache.

"_Somebody's_ checkin' in!" confirmed a light brownly bearded humanoid with beady, glassy eyes.

"Somebody's _checkin'_ in!" another humanoid repeated, one with a dark, bushy beard and a red cap.

One of them struck up a chord and started playing, which overwhelmed me a bit—especially when Pops started singing to the tune.

"_Well,_ _there's_ _no_ _fire_ _in_ _the_ _fireplace,  
__There's_ _no_ _carpet_ _on_ _the_ _floor;  
__Don't_ _try_ _to_ _order_ _dinner,_ _there's_ _no_ _kitchen_ _anymore_.  
_But_ _if_ _the_ _road's_ _been_ _kind_ _of_ _bumpy_ _and_ _you_ _need_ _to_ _rest_ _a_ _spell,  
__Well,_ _welcome_ _home_ _to_ _The_ _Happiness_ _Hotel!"_

While I was still recovering from that impromptu burst of music, the old coot took out an antique feather quill and some rotten-looking old paper. "Hmm...How do you want to pay? There's a) cash, and b) credit card."

Looking just as flustered as I felt, Kermit glanced back at me in alarm. Lowering my voice as much as I could, I hissed, "Well, we could always sneak out in the middle of the night!"

Even with my precaution the old guy had obviously heard me, as he remarked, "That seems to be a popular choice around here..." before writing "_Sneak_ _out_ _in_ _the_ _middle_ _of_ _the_ _night_" on the paper. I'd thought he was joking, but he just seemed to accept in a sort of Zen-like mode that we wouldn't pay him. Maybe no one did, and they were all staying here for free. It wasn't that far-fetched...

"What names are you registering under?"

I retained a momentary shock. I didn't remember the false names we'd used at the door, and by their expressions I didn't think Foz or Kermit did either. Before our silence got so long that we became objects of suspicion, I asked, "Can we remain nameless?"

Instead of alleviating the tension, my reply only strengthened it. All the musicians on the landing fell completely silent, and Pops squinted at us through his spectacles. _Why_ _do_ _I_ _always_ _come_ _up_ _with_ _the_ _wrong_ _sentence?_ I wondered, fearing for my life.

The moment passed and everyone returned to normal. "OK," the old coot shrugged, then jotted down "_Nameless_" on the sheet. Then opening the drawer in the check-in desk, he pulled out a rather rusty key that I doubted could actually function in that context. He handed the key to Kermit. "You're on the second floor," the coot informed us, then leaned his head back on the desk and fell soundly asleep once more. I could hear him mumbling in his sleep. "_If_ _you've_ _got_ _luggage_ _keep_ _it_ _handy,_ _but_ _you're_ _runnin'_ _out_ _of_ _luck_..._'cus_ _the_ _bellhops_ _need_ _to_ _organize_ _and_ _the_ _elevator's_ _stuck_..."

I decided to ignore him in case singing turned out to be catching.

———

**STATLER**: Smart idea.

———

After much trial-and-error in the ways of finding out _which_ room on the second floor was ours, we figured out which lock fit our key and sauntered in. The paint was as cracked and peeling as the job downstairs, and the only light fixture had a severely broken bulb. And considering that the room only had _one_ bed—one of those that popped out of the wall, by some coincidence—I really hoped that we wouldn't have to stay the night. For obvious reasons, and also for the fact that as soon as we just _touched_ the bed it popped back _into_ the wall. My cohorts didn't seem to mind much, though.

"Great, we're in!" Foz exclaimed, jumping up and down a little. His tie was jittering on his neck, he was making so much turbulence. Kermit stopped him with a meaningful look—as meaningful as an eyedlid-less frog can give—and they turned back to me.

"What do we do now, Phyllis?" Kermit asked in a low voice.

Why was it that all these Muppets thought I had all the answers? I _didn't_. I was a two-bit detective who could only narrowly avoid being thrown out of my apartment by sharing rent with a frog. And now that we were harboring an accused murderer and trying to find the _real_ culprit, suddenly _I'm_ shouldering the responsibility. What was I—

Sensing that I was starting to enter the first stages of hysteria, I kicked myself in the shin. (A rather difficult accomplishment, I might add.) _Breathe_ _in,_ _breathe_ _out_. _You've_ _read_ _all_ _of_ _the_ Basil of Baker Street _books_. _You_ _can_ _do_ _this_.

"We have to find out more about Floyd in this place," I began slowly, "and what he was doing here that had Pépe all freaked out."

Kermit mulled it over, stroking his beard. "If that's the case," he proposed, adjusting his banjo, "then we should probably all split up. That way, we can cover more—"

"No!" I protested almost immediately. Kermit and Foz turned quickly towards me, trying to figure out the purpose behind my strange rejection of the idea.

"What's wrong?" Fozzie asked concernedly. He had removed his sunglasses to look at me more closely.

"That's not a good idea," I explained, winded. Trying to get my bearings, I loosened my neckerchief, took off my hat and sunglasses, and lowered my collar. I had felt too stuffed-in with all that concealment in place, and now that I had freed my face I could now breathe evenly again. The oxygen seemed to be reaching my brain more easily too, and I could think considerably more clearly than I had during my previous panic attack. With a hand to my temples, I started to speak again. "We can't let Fozzie on his own, for starters; if someone recognizes him and knows about the murder, we'll all be in big trouble because 'Mr. Mutation' will know we went in with him. Then they'll anonymously send the whole lot of us to the police—without risking themselves, of course." There _was_ always the possibility that the whole lot of them would accept an accused criminal into their lot much faster than an honest Muppet, but I didn't want to get anyone's hopes up.

Foz was staring at me in wide-eyed fascination, much as he had at the flat when I had just explained his entire electrical budget without any prior knowledge. I wasn't looking at him, though. If I was a real Bogart, I'd say that "there was pain in my eyes, clouding them until it hurt to think". But I'm not a Bogart. I was thinking more of how things would go if I actually told the Chief my opinion on his involvement in the matter of investigating the murder. When I got to the part of my being squashed by his humongous police-issue club, I snapped out of it and went on with my explanation. "And plus, even though we're kind of conspicuous walking around as a threesome, we'd have to all keep our stories straight or someone'll get suspicious and kick us out—or worse."

"Hmmmmm..." Kermit was obviously trying to rationalize things out. I left the heavy mental lifting up to him. I was _sick_ and _tired_ of all this thinking. "What if I went with Fozzie?" Kermit suggested. Fozzie perked up interestedly. "I'll keep an eye on him, and you can conduct your own investigation. Two won't look as suspicious as three, and then we'll report back here at an arranged time."

I considered it, Foz's eyes following the conversation as if it was a game of tennis. Well, the ball was in _my_ court now, and I had to play to the best possible outcome. "I agree with that," I concurred, "but, and I don't want to sound self-centered, what about me? Sooner or later, I'll slip up and someone will figure out that I'm not a Muppet. What then? It'll be difficult to convince them of my alleged 'fur condition' for starters..." I scratched my head and sighed. "No, it's no good. We have to stick together."

We sat in silence for a short while, then Fozzie piped up. "So what're we going to do?" Both he and Kermit were looking to me, but I was still trying to think it out. In a sort of response to my silence, Fozzie suggested, "If we ask a lot of people, we could find out what's going on with The Electric Mayhem."

I shook my head, my hand practically making a crease in my chin. While the two of them stared at me in another question, I took a deep breath. I had to figure this out thoroughly; our well-being could depend on my answer. "If we ask about The Electric Mayhem and Floyd," I tried slowly, "...you _saw_ what happened when we asked Pépe. If we go around asking everyone, we're liable to run into a lot of folks reacting the same way. Someone'll get suspicious, and outcome 1: they'll tell Floyd, who might figure out what I'm doing; outcome 2: if they _know_ Floyd and his pals are doing something that should be kept secret, they'll distrust us and either turn us in or _do_ us in." I waited for the implications to sink in, as much for my benefit as theirs. This was going to be tough.

Hesitantly, sounding afraid of my answer, Kermit asked, "Then what will we have to do?"

I rubbed my temples before telling them. And by the expression on both his face and Fozzie's, I knew that it would take a lot of preparation to get them ready for what we were going to do. But it was something that would have to be done, and the sooner the better.

I just hoped that someone here knew Floyd's room number.

———

_A/N: The song "Happiness Hotel", featured in this chapter, was written by Joe Raposo and initially appeared in _The Great Muppet Caper_. The lyrics were obtained from "The Muppets 25th Anniversary CD: Music, Mayhem and More"._


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**: Break and Enter

**STATLER**: ...Huh?

**WALDORF**: Hey Statler, I think they're waiting for us to say something funny.

**STATLER**: Oh yeah? Well, just for that I'm not GOING to.

**WALDORF**: Yeah! We don't do requests!!

**STATLER**: Go away! Boo!

———

Luckily, we didn't have to go far before we were given directions to the room The Electric Mayhem shared...kind of ironic, though, was that the little, yellowish balding guy with prawnish eyes later turned out to be Nigel, the conductor for The Electric Mayhem at Uncle Henson's Theater. The Theater personnel had forgotten all about him, so he hadn't been summoned back when they found out about the murder. He just walked away, sighing "Nobody ever remembers poor Nigel" after he told us what we needed to know. I would've felt sorry for him if I wasn't feeling sorrier that I'd have to smuggle all three of us into room 7.

Taking a quick look around, Foz informed us that there was no one looking. I had donned my stifling disguise again, so I had to try and peek into the keyhole through the dark sunglasses. I had to squint hard to see it, but eventually I did—the door was completely locked, and there was a wad of gum in the keyhole, just like at the Theater. I moved to shield Kermit from passerbys' lines of vision and stood facing the opposite direction from the door, whistling and fiddling with my guitar strings. I positioned Fozzie to block Kermit too, and together we attained a reasonable degree of innocence while Kermit stuck a paperclip in the keyhole to clear out the gum. He then proceeded to _pick_ the lock, and popped right back up behind us when he was finished and hissed, "All clear!"

"Good," I muttered back, scanning the halls. We were on the ground floor of the hotel, and The Electric Mayhem's room was just behind and to the side of the check-in desk. I could see the back of "Pops" collapsed in sleep on his desk. We couldn't arouse suspicion for whatever cost, because he was _right_ _there_ and primely situated to have us thrown out of this illegal community—if we were _lucky_. "Are there," I mumbled to Kermit, "wads of paper stuck around the hinges?"

I heard a small shuffle as Kermit descended once more behind the protection of me and Fozzie. I nodded lethargically to a passing musician, a lady mouse in a sort of nightcap. She smiled a little lopsidedly back before hurrying on. There was a little more rustling from behind me, but I quickly masked that sound by pretending to tune my guitar. That, at least, kept several Muppets away from us. I'm tone-deaf as a bat—and that's a terrible thing for me to do to bats, comparing myself to them. Just before I _myself_ had to clap my hands over my ears, Kermit returned. "Not anymore," he announced.

I looked around at Fozzie, who seemed pretty nervous. But he nodded apprehensively. "On my signal," I breathed, my hand snaking towards the doorknob. "Three—two—one—"

I wrenched the doorhandle and we literally tumbled into the room, shutting the door quickly. For a moment we just stood there pressed against the door, breathing in and out very heavily. Then I bent back down to the lock, heart racing, and stuck the paper back in the hinges, then the gum back in the keyhole, then finally locked it all up again. We had agreed to do this back in our room—we didn't want anyone to suspect that anything was wrong. Though I felt more like slumping down and waiting for my breathing to return to normal, I stood up. "Fan out and look for anything important. Try not to touch anything. And most important, _don't_ _turn_ _on_ _the_ _lights!_" My voice stopped Fozzie just as he was reaching for the switch.

"Why not the lights?" Kermit asked, his voice down. He was already scanning over the music records stacked in cardboard boxes at the back of the room.

"You _want_ anyone to know we're in here?" I hissed back. I was panic-stricken, so my voice had a quiveringly sharp edge to it. "Leave the lights off, and no one'll know a thing."

Though it was obvious that he found the whole thing dishonest, Kermit assented and kept on looking through the records. Taking a second to collect myself, I analyzed the room.

It looked kind of like Floyd's dressing room as I had seen it in Uncle Henson's Theater, but packed with more stuff and a bit better furnished. There was a bed already folded out from the wall, and even with its huge size it was somehow covered with three beanbag chairs. There was a fourth, a larger pink one, in the corner, and a sort of a cardboard box lined with newspaper off to the side. There were records of all kinds everywhere, ranging from The Beetles to The Monkeys to Strike Jones and his City Sneakers. Also present was a pile of unopened mail scattered across the floor, looking very suspiciously like bills. In the back a stack of giant posters leaned against the wall, almost scaring me out of my wits when I suddenly saw the Jimi Hen-drips one staring at me.

———

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: Will you stop with the puns already?!

———

I was just starting to wonder exactly _how_ many left-handed guitars Floyd and Janice had all together when I was interrupted by a cry from Kermit. "Phyllis!" he hissed, his eyes wide—wider than usual. He was staring at something, trembling and scared out of his wits. I hurriedly joined him over where he was, the record boxes. Giving him a questioning and not unapprehensive look, Kermit just mutely pointed at something at the top of one of the opened boxes. My insides quivering, I slowly inched myself over to where the dim light from the closed and covered windows could shine in, and all of a sudden I spotted the—

—the critics' nasty reviews for some almost-potential Broadway musical called "Manhattan Melodies" in some magazine called _Scat Fancy_.

"I slaved day and night over that script when I got out of college!" Kermit moaned, slumping on the floor. "And the producers had said they'd call me to get it on the stage!"

I thought it over for a second. "When you got out of college...Kermit, how long ago was that?"

"Now that I think about it," Kermit realized slowly from the floor, "it _has_ been a few years since I heard from Lord Lew Grade..."

I rolled my eyes and vowed to stay silent about it. Fozzie, however, had his own matters to speak up about. "At least you found something _interesting_," he complained, looking over the scraps of paper littering a derelict desk in the corner of the room. Even though I had warned him to avoid touching things, he had of course started pawing through the pile. "There's just some music over here...something called 'Can You Picture That', then 'Jam', and 'Ain't Misbehavin' ', and 'Love You to Death'...oh yeah, and a receipt from a shady-sounding store for a hundred and fifty dollars."

I was at the desk in a flash. "Give me that!" I cried, snatching it out of his hands. Lifting my sunglasses up over the top of my head, I squinted at the scrap of cashier paper. Right there at the top, printed on cheap stationary, was the singular name "El Sleezo", below which was hand-scrawled in slipshod cursive the words "Muppet Labs", a series of dots, and then the price. A hundred and fifty dollars. I couldn't conceive of Floyd having that much money, never mind actually spending it on something other than a homeowner's bill. Where could he have gotten that cash, and what would it be that he had purchased with it?

Fozzie was looking at me expectantly, as I was sure he would, and Kermit had sufficiently hauled himself out of his depression to await my words.

"We've got to find out what it was they bought," I ordered, thinking out loud. Even I could hear the desperation in my voice. I looked around me at Kermit and Fozzie, who were still both stationary. "What are we waiting for?" I hissed. "We've got to find it!"

We didn't even get to start looking, because at that moment I heard voices in the corridor, voices coming closer. I froze stock-still in the middle of the room as I realized what was going on.

The Electric Mayhem was coming back.

———

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

———

After the paper wadding had audibly been removed from the crack near the doorframe, Kermit unexpectedly snapped into action and glanced wildly around the room like a deer in headlights. Then with a burst of strength that not even the experts have yet figured out the origins of, he hauled both me and Fozzie behind the huge, loose Jimi Hen-drips poster. We had only just managed to calm our breathing and suitably hide any protruding appendages before a key turned in the lock and the door creaked open.

"—and so, I mean," Janice was saying as the dim lightbulb was flicked on, "he said he _totally_ liked our jams, and, like, that he listened for us every day. Yeah, for _sure-lly_."

I could see their shadows against the opposite wall when I hesitantly peeked around the corner of the poster. I counted all five of them right there: Floyd, Janice, Zoot, Dr. Teeth and Animal. We had no way to get out past all of them.

"An' it's all due to our little wonder!" Dr. Teeth laughed boisterously, and the indirect glare of the light off his gold tooth made me flinch. His shadow was bouncing up and down in his laughter. "How'd we ever get along without it?"

"We had to put up with that eagle, that's what." The voice, smooth as silk and lightly airy, made my insides shut down entirely. It was Floyd. His voice had a rough edge in it that I wasn't very accustomed to. The shadow's posture was slouched and casual just like Floyd, but his voice was bitter. "I'm glad that he's gone now, even if it's makin' Phyll suspicious that I wasn't at that Theater."

Detecting my name in the conversation was just making me more uneasy. Dr. Teeth, however, was loud and carefree. "Hey, we was 'jammin' ' at the time, Floyd!" he exclaimed. "We _couldn't_ come to the Policemen's Ball, even if they'd _invited_ us to play, 'cus we had other obligations to our soon-to-be devoted fans!"

Zoot's thin, strained voice broke in. _I_ was looking around for some way to possibly get out, but as the moments ticked by those chances were getting slimmer and slimmer. "Hey, man, are you sure we should be doin' that stuff?" Zoot wheezed, and his shadow picked up the shadow of his saxophone almost like in self-defense. "I mean, even if our talent _does_ get us discovered, someone might remember us from this and the word'll get out. We'd never be able to play again!"

Floyd's voice smoothed out any flaws in whatever they were, or had been, planning. "You know us, Zoot. Who'll ever catch us? No one'll realize _what_ we're doing. They'll think it's 'cus of someone else that that's happenin'! Who'd think that us musicians would be able to do _that_ kind of stuff without help?"

I could see Zoot's shadow scratch his head beneath his bucket hat. "Well..." he said finally, "OK. But if I lose my groove again, you'll remind me, right?"

I was wondering what they were talking about. What were they doing? And what was going on? But more importantly, I could see five shadows but I'd only heard any sounds from four of them. Where was—

"Animal!" That was Dr. Teeth. "Hey Animal, whatcha' doing, going off into space like that? You _know_ we can't afford no rockets!"

From the shadow Animal was casting, I felt eerily sure that he was looking right at our hiding spot. This I was worried enough by, but then I heard Animal cry out, "WO-MAN!"

Fozzie and Kermit were definitely starting to tremble now, and I was already joining in. Just our luck that we'd have to suspect the band with the drummer who has a sixth sense for the female gender.

"Well, yeah, fer _sure_," Janice asserted annoyedly, and if she could ever have refrained from squinting I'd have said that she'd rolled her eyes. "Well, we all _know_ I'm a gal, and I'd, like, kind of like to _keep_ it that way!"

Even though The Electric Mayhem were thankfully ignoring Animal's insistances, I still felt jumpy as I continued to sense Animal glaring at us from the other side of the poster. "WO-MAN!" he protested, and I heard the rattle of the chain around his neck as, from what I could tell by the shadows, he tried to pull out of Floyd's firm grasp on his "leash". "WO-MAN! WO-MAN!"

"Cool it, Animal," Floyd demanded, and though I could still feel Animal watching his yells ceased. _I_ _owe_ _you_ _one,_ _Floyd_, I thought silently. Though he'd hopefully never know _why_ I owed him, I aspired to repay the favor in some way, sometime. But my first goal was to get out of here. If Animal spotted us while we left, we were goners for sure. But if somehow neither he nor The Electric Mayhem saw us leaving...

Silently, Kermit nudged me in the side, and though I remained completely still I had to momentarily refrain from yelping as I glanced around at him in fear. _The_ _window_, he mouthed, and pointed upwards. I looked up, and saw that sure enough the window was right there above my head. The drapes were slightly flapping, and the shutters were open, exposing the bare and rusted sewer wall beyond it, but the window was closed. How could we also _open_ the window before escaping, _still_ avoiding detection?

———

**WALDORF**: Dun dun dun dunnnn...

**STATLER**: At a time like this, shouldn't we start playing "Taps" too?

**STATLER AND** **WALDORF**: OHOHOHOHO!

———

As quietly as possible, Kermit hissed, "It's...not...completely...shut."

I made with my eyes a sort of questioning look. I had never put my sunglasses back on from when I'd looked at the receipt.

"There's a crack," he whispered, "that's slightly open. Fozzie and I think we can force it silently until it's wide enough to squeeze through. Too many of us pushing, though, and we'll be found." His low voice quavered in what was unmistakably a pause for permission.

I took a deep breath, then with all my heart behind it, I replied, "Go for it." No longer could I conceive of a moment when I hadn't want the two of them to come with me after Floyd.

While my companions attempted to open the window, I skittishly turned my attention back to the conversation going on around me—or, more accurately, in front of me behind a thin sheet of glazed, fancy paper. It's kind of hard to feel secure when you're cowering behind a poster of a five-foot-tall rooster playing the guitar with his tongue.

"Our 'reception' went well though, huh, Floyd?" Dr. Teeth declared, moving more out of the center of the room. Now, to my distress, I could begin to be able to see him around the corner of the poster. Therefore, theoretically, there was the possibility of _him_ being able to see _me_—and Fozzie and Kermit pushing on the window.

"I guess so," Floyd commented back, and he too began to move closer to the outskirts of my scope of vision. And with him, Animal, who was staring very fixedly at my hiding spot.

"What're you _talking_ about, Floyd?" Janice breezed, and I saw her flip her stringy hair over her shoulder. "I mean, like, we were like the _bomb_, I mean, fer _suure_!"

"It was our first _real_ test, too," Dr. Teeth went on. I felt an apprehensive sneeze coming on, but somehow managed to stifle it and kept watching as Dr. Teeth plunked himself on one of the beanbag chairs on the fold-out bed. "Actually _jamming,_you know?"

With no conception of what they were going on and on about, all I had time to pray for was that the window would open just as silently as Kermit had said it would. But that need was strengthened with several others as I heard Zoot interject, "Hey man, do we still have that _receipt?_"

I froze, and self-consciously started searching for it with my gloved hand. The receipt was definitely crumpled up in the outer pocket of my jacket, and I closed my hand around it protectively. _Come_ _on,_ _Kermit_, I pleaded silently. Meantime, Floyd was wandering over to the decrepit writing desk and ruffling around with the papers. After taking a short journey through the scrap paper, he stiffened confusedly before bending down and rearranging the items considerably more slowly. Standing up and scratching his head, he called, "Hey, did any of you guys take the receipt? 'Cus it ain't here!"

Zoot, Janice and Dr. Teeth exchanged glances. Floyd was just scratching his head. "Maybe Animal ate it!" Dr. Teeth joked, and Janice at least joined in on his guffaws. Floyd took a long, slow look at Animal, who looked up and widened his eyes innocently before baring his teeth.

"Animal didn't take it," Floyd announced, then began looking around the room. I instinctively shrunk further behind the poster. "Where could it have gone?"

"It's not like it's totally _important_, Floyd," Janice stuck in, shrugging. This slight excess movement of her shoulders tightened her tank top even more around her torso. "I mean, we weren't going to like _return_ it."

"Yeah, that's true..." Floyd acknowledged slowly, then tore his eyes away from the desk. "Still, it'd be nice to find out where they sell _more_ of that sort of stuff."

"Lenny said more'd be coming soon," Zoot added, and his fingers impulsively closed on several of the fingerings of his sax. "New line, 'r somethin'."

I left the conversation again, because I felt another tap on my shoulder. Looking up, Kermit had his finger to his lips and the window was half-open. Just wide enough, and the Hen-drips poster was just tall enough to keep most of the window a blind spot from The Electric Mayhem's point of view. I motioned for Kermit to slip through first, both since he was the smallest and that he'd be able to watch out for Foz if I...I didn't want to think about that. But even with a silent round of bickering, Kermit grudgingly slid out the open window and below. Thankfully, The Electric Mayhem were on the ground floor, and not higher up like our room was.

While I helped Fozzie on his way out as best I could, Janice started talking again. "It's just too, like, bad about Sam, though, y'know?"

This left me stiff in my tracks, but fortunately not too frozen to miss scooping Foz's sunglasses out of the air after they fell off his nose. Carefully sticking those in my pocket too, I kept easing the window open very slowly for him as I continued to listen.

"Too bad about _what_ about Sam?" Floyd asked cagily.

Janice erupted in a fit of giggles. "Like," she gasped, "it was too bad he didn't go _sooner!_"

———

**WALDORF**: AAAH! None of the people in this story know good comedy!

**STATLER**: You old fool!

**WALDORF**: What?

**STATLER**: Name ONE kind of GOOD comedy.

**WALDORF**: Well, there's, um...that is to say...there's...

**STATLER**: You see? There IS no such thing as GOOD COMEDY!

———

All of them were overcome with laughter over Janice's joke while Fozzie slipped out next to Kermit. I stuck my head out the window and looked five feet down at them. Fozzie waved, but Kermit seemed apprehensive. I didn't really blame him. _Come_ _down_. That's what I was sure he was praying. Well, I wouldn't want to devote him of his religious freedom—or me of my well-being. Gently handing my guitar down to Kermit, I turned around, stuck a foot out the window and started clambering out backwards—then received a sudden showing of dread.

The Jimi Hen-drips poster had only stayed in place to cover us because we were holding it up, and it was leaning on _us_. With no support behind it, it was slowly caving forwards towards The Electric Mayhem, revealing me and my attempted escape foot by foot.

Of course I started clambering out even faster, but gravity was considerably more physically fit than I was. Seeing as the last time I'd successfully run a three-minute mile was while I was being born, I was only halfway departed before the poster gracefully slid to a silent face-down position on the floor.

And even though the rest of the band was laughing in the opposite direction, Animal was staring right at me.

"WO-MAN!"

Even before he'd gotten the second syllable out, my feet were on the ground and the three of us were running like the Dickens.

We only stopped short once we'd rounded the corner of the building, and leaning against the rickety wooden slats we tried our best to breathe. Fozzie was mopping his brow, and Kermit looked nervous enough that he paled even from his normal shade of green. Once Fozzie and I had both re-donned our dark sunglasses, Fozzie burst out in wild emotion. "We've gotta get out of here!"

Kermit was siding with Fozzie. "He's right, Phyllis. That was _too_ _close_." He started to run down the street, but with a swift motion I hooked the collar of his grimy t-shirt. He glared at me, both irritably and panickedly. "We have to!" he insisted forcefully. "We can't just...just go back _in_ there!"

"We're _going_ to have to." My voice was quivering, as much as I tried to hide it from them. In response to their both frightful and doubt-ridden looks, I asked, "How would you like it if we, according to the clerk, never _left_ The Happiness Hotel, yet we somehow got out the door of this whole...well, village?" Kermit's answer dying in formation was enough of a reply for me. "We have to formally check out, or there'll be trouble. And there's still something I have to look at."

Two minutes later, we had reentered through a window to a mercifully empty room. Empty, that is, except for the Muppet singing in the shower in the adjoining room. But he didn't seem to mind when we jimmied the door to his rooms open and quietly exited into the hallway.

When we got back to the check-in desk, "Pops" was still snoring peacefully face-down on the desk. Fozzie leaned over him and, after a nod from Kermit, began to gently shake the old man awake. "Sir?"

The old guy lifted his head and squinted back at us. "Yeah? 'Nameless', right?"

"That's us," Kermit confirmed, leaning over the desk. His banjo was still slung across his back, having faced only small difficulties during the journey—lucky thing. "We'd like to check out for the night."

The old coot sat up in surprise. "You're leaving at _this_ hour?" he protested. "But we've got food! We've got sleeping quarters! Why in Muppetburg would you check out?"

I fumbled for an explanation, which Kermit provided for us again. "We have a previous engagement; some nightclub owner wants to hear us play. After that, we've gotta stay in some place he could reach us at _without_ exposing _this_ joint."

Nodding in comprehension, Pops scribbled something down on a piece of paper. I leaned over and saw that it was a log of who had checked in and out and when. With that, I was suddenly reminded of my other goal.

"Say, mister," I broke in casually, leaning over on the counter of the desk. Propping my chin on a gloved hand—still careful to keep my coat sleeves over my all-too-human-looking skin—I asked, "Would you consider letting me see the guest list of the Hotel?"

"Sure," he replied automatically, and he had a slip of paper halfway out of a nearby drawer before he stopped. "Why?" the old man inquired suspiciously, adjusting his glasses.

Once again, it was Kermit who jumped to my rescue. "We'd like to see who's here," he put forth, "so if we recognize some of the names, we'll know if we want to jam with 'em sometime."

I was completely in Kermit's debt at that moment as the coot shrugged and willingly handed me the list. "Thanks," I made sure to say, before inspecting the piece of paper. It was all hand-written in an ornately casual script, so it took a moment to decipher the words, but I got the shape of the letters down quickly. Looking over the list, I _did_ find a few names I knew—Marvin Suggs, The Electric Mayhem, Nigel, Rowlf, even Shoeshine Scooter—but there was another one written down there, actually two, which made me stare at the paper for a while in surprise. If they lived here...if that was it...pieces of the puzzle began falling into place in my head. Not very many, mind you, but enough to quicken the gears in my brain. I might not have gotten the whole picture puzzle together, but I had at least filled in the northwest corner of the sky.

And perhaps with that chunk I'd be able to get the rest of the thing put together once and for all.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14**: Fateful Encounters

_Bang!_ _Bang!_ _Bang!_

Nobody was answering the door.

_Bang!_ _Bang!_ _Bang!_

A very confused Fozzie and Kermit were trailing behind me as I attempted to break down the side door of Uncle Henson's Theater. We were all still in our musicians' disguises (more or less—I had discarded most of it and Kermit no longer had a beard) and we were close to sopping wet after a disastrous rendezvous with the river once we'd made our eventful, out-of-breath exit from the sewer community. After I'd seen those names on the guest list at The Happiness Hotel, I'd had no further reason to linger and had literally sprinted out of there as fast as I could, almost leaving my companions behind. We'd tried to hitch a bus or a cab or _something_ to get us sufficiently back to the Theater, but after seeing our wet clothes anyone who'd stopped had immediately driven away again. We were much later returning than I'd hoped, but it was better than nothing and this _had_ to be done tonight.

_Bang!_ _Bang!_ _Bang!_ "Open up!!" I shouted.

———

**STATLER**: Not so loud, you'll wake the readers!

**WALDORF**: ZZZ...Huh?

**STATLER**: See what I mean?

———

At long last the door was opened, but not by someone I was particularly glad to see. "Whatever it is—" the Chief growled, then stopped in distaste when he recognized me. "PEPPER!" He bent down and glared at me with one large, yellow eye. "Do you have _any_ idea what time it is?"

"Guessing by your pajamas, I'd say it was around noon," I retorted breathlessly, referring to the Chief's less-than-regulation getup. I tried to push past him—a completely futile effort. "Let us in."

"Not on your life, Pepper!" the Chief shot back. "I recognize that Oznowicz fellow, but not the green one. Who's he?"

I elbowed Kermit before he could answer. "Kermit the Frog, my assistant detective. Sort of a Doctor Watson type."

Chief Sweetums bristled at that. "Don't use hospital talk with me!" he bellowed. "You should know that I don't have time to watch _E_._R_.!"

I tried _very_ hard not to roll my eyes, but this time I lost my control in that area. That was a mistake, because the Chief then retreated back inside the Theater and began to shut the door. I stopped him mostly, though, by holding the door as open as I could. This, needless to say when combating the Chief's sheer brute strength, was rather painful and stretched several muscles that I hadn't even been aware that I possessed. "You've got to let me in!" I persisted. "I need to see Wayne and Wanda!"

Fozzie was apparently very offended by this. "Wayne and Wanda?!" he cried, putting himself directly between me and the Chief. "Why would you want to see _them?_" the bear complained forcibly, once more pulling on the hem of my coat. "I told you, they are the _worst!_ And besides that, how could you even, even _think_ of other performers when you have _right_ _before_ _you_ the _greatest_ comic of them all, Foz—"

To my great, almost heart-stopping relief, Fozzie caught himself just in time. "Foz—F—Fonzie! TVLand's playing the _Happy_ _Days_ reruns tonight!"

"How is _that_ right before us?" the Chief growled suspiciously. Good ol' policemen, always know exactly when they're _not_ supposed to demand the truth.

I thought quick. "What's the time?"

The Chief glanced at his watch. "Eight o'clock."

"The reruns are at ten. That's 'right before us'."

Momentarily stumped and not happy about it, the Chief grumbled and started scratching his head in thought. We took that pause to sneak through the open door and directly past him into the corridor, which was completely silent and empty.

"Foz," I hissed once we were definitely out of the Chief's earshot. "You used to work here. Where's Wayne and Wanda's dressing room?"

"Phyllis, what's this all about?" Kermit interrupted. "You ran right out of The Happiness Hotel like you had the scoop of the century. Or like the Devil was after you."

"It could be either one," I replied, scanning the hallway for some kind of indicator as to where the young singers were. "We've got to find Wayne and Wanda. Then you'll find out what's going on."

Kermit didn't like this answer very much, but he couldn't really change it now. Fozzie was begrudgingly pointing out the door to Wayne and Wanda's room, and I had already made a beeline for it and started pounding on the door.

_Bang!_ _Bang!_ _Bang!_

———

**WALDORF**: Quit with the noise already, I'm trying to sleep!

**STATLER**: You old fool! You slept through EXPLOSIONS during The Muppet Show! And this is READING, not LIVING!

**WALDORF**: WE'RE both here, aren't we?

**STATLER**: Hey, you're right!

**STATLER** **AND WALDORF**: AAAH!!

———

Sooner than the Chief had reacted just a minute before, Wayne, still fully dressed in the Napoleon getup, flung open the door. Directly behind him was Wanda, and both were still blinking the signs of weariness out of their very humanesque eyes. Leaning into the doorway, I casually tipped my hat to the two of them as if I wasn't out of breath from just having run clear across town in sopping wet clothes. "Evening. Wayne, Wanda."

I saw the two of them exchange worried glances before responding. "Evening, Ms. Pepper," Wayne offered, looking past me at my companions. "And sirs."

"W-won't you come in?" asked Wanda, advancing further towards the door and beckoning us in. Her emerald-green dress was still the same one as it had been this afternoon; it didn't look like either one of them had been planning on sleep very much. I accepted her proposition and ventured inside, waving towards Kermit and Fozzie to follow. Both of them seemed to still be wondering what I was up to, and they weren't alone.

"What brings you here again, Ms. Pepper?" Wayne inquired once we were inside and Wanda had shut the door. The room had a pair of sort of makeshift beds set up in the middle, as well as a wooden chair in the corner and a partition screen with a mirror off to another side. I stood, and though Fozzie followed my example, Kermit plunked himself on the chair while Wayne and Wanda sat together on one of the beds. Wayne very impressively doffed his Napoleon hat and casually threw it to the top of one of the bedposts, which very promptly collapsed and spoiled the effect. While the dust settled, I, in true _Thin_ _Man_ style, started the questioning.

"So, you have no financial advantage whatsoever at the Theater, though suspicions have been made that you two have been receiving more money than the rest of the performers?" I asked slowly.

"Not a chance!" Wayne insisted, much as he had when I had asked him the same question before. Leaning forward on the bed, he asserted, "Wanda and I may have been respected performers under Sam's 'wing', so to speak, but we certainly know nothing about a financial advantage."

I took my time again, pacing the room like any good movie detective. Though I would have expected the impact to be considerably reduced by Fozzie's imitative pacing not two feet behind me, both Wayne and Wanda were acting a little nervous by my silence. Kermit looked like he was trying to figure me out without speaking in any way. Fozzie, as mentioned above, was just matching my footsteps.

Finally I eased off, turning back and speaking to the young couple again. "Nice version of the truth," I commended, hands in both pockets of my coat, "but lacking a little something." Wayne and Wanda were visibly shaking now. I began to pace again, but this time with my eye on the two of them. "Try the _whole_ story, now."

"Yeah," Fozzie parroted, "the _whole_ story!"

I shot a glare at him, but he didn't even notice. He was too busy staring fixedly at Wayne and Wanda, who were still fidgety.

"We...we _told_ you the whole story!" Wanda protested, her hands clenching in the folds of her dress. She was looking right at me through her humongous eyelashes and her round face contorted in a picture of nervousness.

I fixed them with a look of my own now, and while their attention was still held I announced simply, "I saw your names on the guest list of The Happiness Hotel." When they stiffened in shock, I prompted them. "Perhaps you'll tell me the story now."

They looked at each other, then Wanda looked up. "You—you've been there?"

I made no move to answer and, to my relief, neither did Foz. Wayne sighed, then admitted, "It's true, we both live at The Happiness Hotel. We—" He started to say something else, then shook his head. It was up to me again.

"Two musicians under the employment of such a successful nightclub as Uncle Henson's Theater shouldn't have to live in such minimum-rent places," I commented, feeling slightly like Lt. Columbo, "especially not illegally."

Someone else might have looked up at me sharply in suspicion since I knew about the sewer community, but Wayne and Wanda were too guilt-ridden to care about that now. "Maybe we're getting a _little_ higher salary than the others' normal rates," Wanda admitted quietly, "but we've got a lot of payments."

"Such as?" That was Kermit.

Wayne sucked in another breath. "In case you've seen one of our performances," he started, "you know that we have a rather catastrophic effect on props and other things whenever we start to sing."

This was beginning to sound familiar, and I knew why—it was almost the same story that Fozzie had given me to explain why he wouldn't have been able to pay me. "So you owed Sam so much that your paycheck is slashed to allow for that," I finished for him. But to my surprise, Wayne shook his head.

"It's not Sam," he protested. "_He_ liked us—the first guy who really did. He paid for all the damages out of his _own_ salary. But our previous engagements...they weren't so lenient." Wayne leaned his head on his hands. "Remember," he told Wanda, "that time we sang 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star'?"

An image filled my mind of a meteor crashing into a small-town nightclub, but I shook it out. "But if Sam held you in such high esteem," I tried, seating myself on the other bed, "surely _he_ would have fixed up some sort of dwelling for you, and you wouldn't have to use the Hotel."

Wayne bent his head even more. "We didn't want to tell him," Wanda confessed. "He thought we were successful, famous, widely-acclaimed singers, and if we told him the truth he might have canceled our act." Wanda looked at me pleadingly. "You won't tell anyone about it, will you, Ms. Pepper?"

I studied her for a moment. "That depends."

"On what, Ms. Pepper?" Wayne asked, desperately searching my face for reassurance. But that was something I had to leave off for later.

"On whether or not you killed Sam the Eagle."

That, at least, had an instant effect on the two of them. "We didn't kill him!" they protested in chorus, each tumbling over the other to explain. Eventually they sorted out the story more sequentially.

"When Sam works late, he likes to check in on the performers to make sure that they're practicing their acts and sleeping when they're supposed to," Wayne told us, his voice quivering just the slightest. "Usually the night shows end around eleven o'clock and he goes home, but that night Sam was late talking to, who was it again, Wanda?"

"That Fozzie Bear fellow," Wanda replied.

I saw Fozzie stiffen, and my brain burst into violent flames. _He hadn't told me that he had spoken to Sam the night before the murder!_ He was certainly casting some worried looks my way, and I didn't blame him because of the pure ferocity powering the ones I was shooting straight back at him. Turning back to Wayne and Wanda, I reconcentrated on their story, though it was hard to get the bear's deception out of my mind.

"Anyways," Wayne went on, "on nights we know Sam is going to be watching, we 'borrow' a room to use. So that's what we did on the night of the...the murder."

"He was certainly talking to that Fozzie for a long time," Wanda continued for him. "It was almost one in the morning when we heard him coming back up the stairs. Then a few minutes later we heard a scream, then a little while afterwards a lot of sirens. We were scared out of our wits and pretended that we were asleep. Someone yelled a question about somebody dying. We heard a lot of footsteps coming up the stairs, then someone accusing the bear of murder. After that there was a sort of scuffling sound and even more footsteps, running fast. After more running from more sets of feet, a policeman flung open the door and told us not to panic, just that Sam had been...someone'd killed him. Then we were brought back downstairs to the Theater by the officers, and we had to wait out the rest of the time in our dressing rooms. And that's it until _you_ showed up."

I mulled this over for a while, then came out with the question I'd been dying to ask. "Do you know anything about The Electric Mayhem?"

Wayne shook his head. "They live at The Happiness Hotel all the time, don't even ever 'borrow' upstairs like we do. The police couldn't find them if they _wanted_ to."

I sighed and stood. "Well, thank you very much," I acknowledged, then headed for the door followed closely by Kermit and Fozzie. Without another word I turned the knob and exited into the hallway, where I turned back to Fozzie piping mad. Wayne and Wanda's door had closed and I was sure that the only potential eavesdropper was the coffee-brown, small police dog Baskerville (who was too far away to hear), I exploded, "Why didn't you _tell_ me that you'd talked to Sam right before the murder?!"

Fozzie toed the floor guiltily. "Phyll-is..." he pleaded, "I thought you'd think I was guilty if I told you."

I crossed my arms. "Well, _not_ having told me makes you seem guiltier, buster!" I was seething. "I don't know _what_ I'm supposed to believe anymore! First Floyd acts guilty, then I discover that Wayne and Wanda have been lying to their boss for _a_ _month_, and now _this_."

"He had a good reason, Phyllis," Kermit protested, and recognizing his defender Fozzie circled around so that Kermit stood directly between Foz and me.

"I don't care _what_ reason!" I cried. "He should've told me—"

I was interrupted by a soft, lilting female voice. "_Excusez_-_moi_, but"—the voice abruptly became considerably violent—"_COULD_ _YOU_ _KEEP_ _IT_ _DOWN?_ _I'M_ _TRYING_ _TO_ SLEEP _HERE!!_"

It was impossible not to identify the telltale sounds of the infamous Miss Piggy. Turning to face her, I was gritting my teeth and about to utter a sharp retort when Miss Piggy uttered a small, very surprised "Oh..."

Staring at her, I saw that her eyes were not locked on _me_ as she said this "Oh...", but on my green little amphibian friend. And when I glanced back at him, he was just as enraptured in her gaze as she was in his. "Oh," Miss Piggy murmured softly, "oh...I'm so sorry to disturb you, mister...?"

"K-Kermit," Kermit stuttered. Neither of their gazes shifted from the other's. "Kermit the Frog." I heard Fozzie sigh annoyedly, but none of that pierced whatever world those two were on. "And you must be the lovely Miss Piggy."

"I must be..." Miss Piggy breathed softly. Music began to rise in the background, accompanied by a whole choir.

"_The_ _first_ _time_ _it_ _happens,_ _no_ _magical_ _change_...  
_No_ _angels_ _appear-ING,_ _no_ _dreams_ _TO_ _ar-RANGE  
__Just_ _war-MER_ _and_ _cold-ER,_ _in_ _spring-TIME_ _or_ _snowww_...  
_The_ _first_ _time_ _it_ _hap-PENS,_ _you—"_

I shot a menacing glare at Officer Baskerville, who quickly turned the phonograph off.

Gritting my teeth and rolling my eyes, I grabbed Kermit roughly by the shirt collar and hauled him away, Fozzie trotting at my heels. "Goodbye..." the frog called to Miss Piggy, who I'm sure sighed in response. This whole thing was making me as sick to my stomach as...as...as the way Kermit had been watching her act when we'd first come to the Theater.

"Where're we going, Phyllis?" Fozzie asked timidly. He knew as well as I did that I still hadn't forgiven him for withholding the information.

"First we're going to look for Dr. Honeydew," I informed him through a clenched jaw. "Then we're heading _back_ to the flat so _you_ can tell us all about your little pre-posthumous chat with our friend Mr. _Sam_ _the_ _Eagle_."

He fell into silence, the opposite of what Kermit did when I finally let him go. "Miss Piggy," he sighed. "Did you see her?"

"I was standing right there," I returned irritably. Kermit didn't even seem to notice my mood.

"She was so sweet..." he went on dreamily. "And kind...and such a conversationalist..."

"Kermit," I growled, "you've known this pig for all of thirty seconds of your life. If you start planning the wedding now, I am going to _strangle_ you until you turn _green_ again."

He didn't hear a word I said. "It's not easy being green..." he sighed.

Vowing to utterly erase Miss Piggy from my memories as soon as I could possibly get this murder case over with, I led the way back to the main room of the "Theater". There were several of the same police officers from this morning crowding the room, most outfitted the same way the Chief had been, with pajamas and nightcaps. No human cop would be caught dead out of uniform while on a beat, but as I had realized countless times since I had transferred to Muppetburg, the two worlds were irrevocably different. I looked around in vain for Dr. Honeydew, but I spotted neither him nor his assistant. For lack of anything else, I woke up a sleeping Officer Beauregard. "Huh?" he stammered as his eyes blinked open. "Wha? Where's the fire?"

"Where's _Dr_. _Honeydew?_" I asked. I had a need for straightforwardness at that moment.

Beauregard furrowed his eyes in thought. "Dr. Honeydew..." he muttered. "Bunsen ...Honeydew...Dr. Honeydew...Dr. Bunsen..." He paused. "What was the question again?"

"_Where is he?_" I demanded, less patient than I realized I ought to be. "TELL ME!"

"OH..." he realized, then spoke quickly. "He left for Muppet Labs again."

"_WHY?_"

"WELL," Beauregard went on, undertaking a rather laborious task in remembering exactly _why_ Dr. Honeydew wasn't on the premises, "um...we already _know_ who killed the...um...the guy who was...well...so...we didn't need him anymore. So he left with that little weird guy who follows him around."

Another complication. _Just_ what I needed. I was about to snap back at him when Fozzie, of all people, spoke up. "If he's not here, Phyllis," he offered, "maybe we can eat or something before we go home. There's always tomorrow!"

Everything in my nature wanted to rebel, but I gave in when I saw the look in Fozzie's eyes. He wanted me to take the time off. He knew, almost as much as did Kermit, that overworking hurt, and even then he might have realized that I was also wounded in more ways than one. So I grinned as well as I could manage, and as the three of us took our leave of the Theater I began to feel almost as if a calm wave were sweeping over me, and that everything might actually be all right in the end.

* * *

Though Movin' Right Along, as we had learned at lunch, was _not_ the prime place to stop for a bite, I felt the need for something familiar to guide me through that night. Though it was well past the usual dinner times and most of the patrons were only there for "Exuberant Hour" sodas, even Uncle Deadly breathing down my neck at every opportunity couldn't sway me from being there. So we sat at the bar in silence while Kermit droned on and on about Miss Piggy. When it got to much more than I could take, I excused myself on the basis of using some lavatorial facility or other and just wandered around the club until I found an empty spot isolated from the rest of the diner. Sitting down, I tried to organize my thoughts, but it wasn't working. My mind was clouded up and I couldn't figure right from wrong. Nothing seemed to function properly in my brain. My mind just kept drifting back to Kermit and Miss Piggy, and then I'd start to feel everything else in me shut down.

"Phyllis?"

Neither the thin voice of Kermit nor Fozzie's distinctive speech interrupted me, but instead a roughly likable tone. I looked up. "Rowlf?"

The Muppet dog was standing right by my table, obviously on his way to his piano. "That's me, in the fur," he replied, and started to laugh. When I didn't join in, he stopped abruptly. "Hey, what's wrong?" Rowlf asked, concern resonating through his voice. "You look like you've got a broken heart."

I started to hotly deny that anything was wrong, but then I actually heard his words. "Yeah," I sighed, "I suppose I...have." I looked up. "It shows?"

Rowlf stood ponderously in silence, then drew up a chair and sat next to me. "Well," he began, "the only cure for that is company, and usually that's not provided by the offending party."

I thought back of Kermit at the bar, elaborating on Miss Piggy's finer points. "No..."

Rowlf tilted his chair in order to insert himself into my line of vision. "Want to talk about it?"

"Not really."

There was a little longer silence, then all of a sudden Rowlf stood up. "C'mon over here," he said, and ushered me forcefully to the piano before seating himself down at it. I sighed. "Hey, music soothes the savage beast," Rowlf chuckled, patting my hand, "and sometimes men're the worst of them all, huh?"

I finally gave a weak laugh at that and, encouraged by this display, Rowlf began to play the piano. He sang, too, and as soon as he started up with that, I forgot mostly about anything that had ever been wrong.

"_You_ _can't_ _live_ _with_ _'em,  
__You_ _can't_ _live_ _without_ _'em_.  
_There's_ _somethin'  
__Ir-re-sis-ta-BULL-ish_ _about_ _'em_.  
_We_ _grin_ _and_ _bear_ _it_ _'cus_ _the_ _nights_ _are_ _long;  
__I_ _hope_ _that_ _somethin'_ _better_ _comes_ _along_._"_

"I see what you mean," I sighed. But little by little, I defrosted and the troubles left me. I began to sing too.

"_It's_ _no_ _good_ _complainin'_ _and_ _pointless_ _to_ _holler_._"_

Rowlf cut in now and added his two cents to the song.

"_If_ _she's_ _a_ _beauty_ _she'll_ _get_ _under_ _your_ _collar_..._"_

I was grinning now, and as we chorused together I felt a lot more at ease with the world than I had just a minute before.

"_They_ _make_ _a_ _monkey_ _out_ _of_ _old_ _King_ _Kong  
__We_ _hope_ _that_ _somethin'_ _better_ _comes_ _along!"_

And as we kept singing, I felt gradually better and better. At least if my heart had broken, it had been temporarily resuscitated.

And when I returned back to the front of the bar, I did it humming all the way.

———

_A/N: The song "The First Time it Happens", featured in this chapter, was written by Joe Raposo and initially appeared in _The Great Muppet Caper_. The lyrics were obtained from "The Muppets 25th Anniversary CD: Music, Mayhem and More"._

_The song "I Hope that Somethin' Better Comes Along", also featured in this chapter, was written by Paul Williams and Kenny Ascher and initially appeared in _The Muppet Movie_. The lyrics were obtained from _The Muppet Movie_ Kermit's 50th anniversary version DVD._


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15**: Muppet Labs

**WALDORF**: My, that was awfully romantic!

**STATLER**: You mean MUSHY!

**WALDORF**: Heh heh! Who goes for THAT junk?

**STATLER**: Wuh-oh...Waldorf, don't look behind you...

**WALDORF**: Huh?

_WHUMPH._

**STATLER**: That was your wife.

**WALDORF**: ...Wake me up in the morning, I think I'll buy one of those romance novels at the bookstore...

———

Even amid all that chaos at the diner, I still managed to grill Foz before going to bed. And when I finished, all I really learned was that Sam's lecture to Fozzie had been about nothing more than his jumping offstage in the middle of his act to greet me. Though the explanation seemed _bona fide_, I still couldn't help feeling a little edgy. After all, he'd had a whole musical sequence and then some to plan his response.

Eight o'clock the next morning, Kermit had to return to _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ to create an article out of the field research he had supposedly been doing during our trek through the sewers, so it was just me and Fozzie who struck out for Muppet Labs after breakfast. I was kind of glad about that, though; even with the reassurances from Rowlf, I wasn't sure if I'd have been able to live through the entire day listening to Kermit again. It was bad enough that I'd probably have to put up with Miss Piggy again during this case, but having to confront Kermit directly after that previous stroke of trauma? That would've taken a miracle.

Muppet Labs, vice-versa of _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ building, had a very professional clinical look on the outside and a very _non_-professional feel of ridiculousness in the lobby. The foyer was bursting with bright colors and various people in lab coats running around fooling with various strange-looking inventions. The clamor was certainly similar to the newspaper offices, but at least there was no Alice.

"HELLO?"

Or so I thought.

As I walked up to the check-in desk, I was dismayed to find what looked like a carbon copy of Alice, from the blue hide to the blonde hair to the annoyingly screechy voice. "HELLO, WELCOME TO MUPPET LABS, WHERE THE FUTURE IS BEING MADE TODAY," she shouted at us while we entered as _her_ way of saying hi. "SIGN IN HERE PLEASE!"

I did so and so did Fozzie, and when he'd replaced the pen I asked, "Do you, by any chance, happen to know or in fact _be_ Alice, the receptionist at _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_?"

"WHO?!"

Judging by the answer, it could very _well_ have been Alice, but I decided to let it lie and got directions to Dr. Honeydew's laboratory as soon as possible. As we left the desk, Fozzie asked from beneath his reacquired Groucho glasses and trenchcoat, "Does she remind you of anybody I know?"

"Just ignore it," I advised him, and hurried us through the Geiger counter check to the west wing of the building.

We found Dr. Honeydew and Beaker in their lab, along with a pig that I didn't recognize. Thankfully, though, he _boar_ (great pun, no?) no resemblance to Miss Piggy.

———

**STATLER**: That's right...it's a great pun, NO!

**WALDORF**: Heh heh heh heh heh...

———

He had a more pear-shaped head as well as glasses and wisps of white hair beneath his ears. He was also dressed more like a Trekkie than a mad scientist, but I wasn't complaining too much about that.

When Dr. Honeydew noticed me and Fozzie standing in the doorway, he very cheerfully waved us in. "Oh, Ms. Pepper, Mr. Oznowicz, come in, come in!" he called. "Sorry I can't shake your hand right now, but I'm handling some Muppet Labs All-Purpose Tenderizer™, and I wouldn't like to turn your hands into flimsy, paper-like substances."

I made a mental note that the next time I shook hands with Dr. Honeydew, I'd make sure he told me what experiments he'd been doing _first_.

"Ah, there we are!" the Doctor continued, wiping his hands off with the hem of Beaker's lab coat (which promptly tenderized it so much that a large chunk of it _splat_ted to the floor), "this is Dr. Julius Strangepork, a fellow colleague of mine at Muppet Labs. Julius, this is Ms. Phyllis Pepper and Mr...Mr. Oznowicz. They were trying to work on a murder at the same time I'd already solved it."

Dr. Strangepork was obviously as disinterested as Dr. Honeydew in anything besides Muppet Labs material. "Oh yes," he commented, brushing it off, "well, _I_ updated your exploding apparatus materials. Wing 'B' is now producing one hundred boxes of exploding socks."

"Very good," Dr. Honeydew replied, perhaps with a twinge of rough irritation, then turned to us. "Well?" he inquired. "Have you come to purchase a Muppet Labs item direct from the source? Only the best-quality materials, you know." He lowered his voice. "And I suppose I could slip you a self-destruct necktie on the sly..."

Fozzie was looking as interested in the offer as before, but I got straight back down to business. "Sorry to disappoint you, Dr. Honeydew, but what we're looking for is information," I apologized.

Beaker emitted another string of mumblingly high-pitched sounds, which the Doctor translated back for us. "Beaky asks," he explained, "did you ever find any evidence against Mr. Bear's involvement after all?"

I started to think about the things I'd heard about Floyd, the things I'd thought about Miss Piggy, the journey to the sewer community, the conversation among The Electric Mayhem, the testimony of Wayne and Wanda... "We're still working on it," I shrugged, then changed the subject. "But we would like to see if we could get a list of all the Muppet Labs products."

Dr. Honeydew practically jumped for joy. "Do you _mean_ it?" he cried, so excited that he started to tremble. "Do you really?" I nodded hesitantly, and he went into more convulsions. After he'd skipped enough to have won a thousand games of hopscotch, the Doctor collapsed on his lab table and started panting heavily before straightening up and readjusting on his glasses. "Do _forgive_ me," he flustered, "I completely lost my head...I'm so sorry..." Still breathing heavily, he reached for Beaker to steady himself, but missed and his arm went straight into a mechanical control console. Hurrying over to assist Dr. Honeydew and perhaps even save the piece of machinery, Beaker tripped over the detached slab of lab coat and tumbled headlong into the control consoles, knocking Dr. Honeydew in front of him.

During this whole demonstration Foz and I just stood there openmouthed.

"Muppet Labs'll be hard-pressed to replace _that_ equipment," Dr. Strangepork muttered to himself from next to us.

Once they'd calculated the damage and disentangled themselves from the mess of wiring and other important-looking things, Dr. Honeydew pulled himself back upright. "The printout of all the Muppet Labs products?" he asked rather breathlessly.

It took me a moment to remember exactly what he was talking about, but eventually I recalled everything. "Yes, please, Doctor."

He adjusted his glasses and glanced at the demolished computer console. "At any other time I would've outrightly said yes, but now that _that's_ happened, I must follow our protocol for using the common databases." Adjusting his glasses again, Dr. Honeydew pulled out an important-looking sheet and, after studying it for a little while, stated, "Now it is the point in the interview when we faithful employees of Muppet Labs, where the future is being made today, must ask, 'why do you require (insert x variable)?' "

Fozzie wasn't about to let anything drop that sailed clear over his head. "Ex-variable?" he cracked, pulling on his ascot. "What, did you get a _divorce?_"

Dr. Honeydew chuckled. "Funny little fellow, isn't he?" he remarked, as though Fozzie wasn't right there. I was beginning to wonder who was the crazier of the two of them. "In this case," he elucidated, encouraged by Beaker's emittances, "the variable would be tantamount to 'the printout of all the Muppet Labs products'. So therefore—"

Before he could begin on a long-winded explanation, I broke in. "That's all very well, Dr. Honeydew, but could we get on with this?"

"Ah, yes, of course," the Doctor rejoined, waving my request away like a fly that he was dealing with very patiently. Picking up a clipboard and ballpoint pen, he began to write furiously on a piece of paper before pausing confusedly to pick up the pen and shake it a little. "That's strange," he muttered, then proceeded to write on Beaker's lab coat, the wearer of which tried desperately but pointlessly to wriggle out of reach. Though no ink mark was made on the coat, the spot that had been written on _did_ burst into flames. Shrieking, Beaker ran around wildly trying to put it out while Dr. Honeydew chuckled to himself again and put the pen back in the chest pocket of his lab coat. "How silly of me," he laughed lightheartedly, turning around the clipboard to reveal a piece of paper with a blackly charred hole in the center. "That was my prototype Muppet Labs Flare Pen™, for writers who like to live on the _dangerous_ side!"

———

**WALDORF**: I'll bet the author of THIS story has one of those pens...

**STATLER**: What makes you say that?

**WALDORF**: Writing something like THIS, you can REALLY tell that an author wants to get ridiculed for the rest of their life!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: OHOHOHO!

———

As the Doctor chortled over his carelessness, Beaker was still trying to find some way to put out his flaming lab coat. Eventually he jumped into a water cooler in the back, sighing thankfully as steam _hissed_ out and into the rest of the room. I was beginning to have my doubts about coming here...

"Can I buy one of those?" Fozzie asked excitedly, so impressed by the display that he'd removed his hat.

"I'm afraid not," the Doctor sighed regretfully. "Upper management deemed it too hazardous for public use."

"Gee, I wonder why," I commented sarcastically, but Dr. Honeydew didn't even seem to register the tone I'd used.

"I wonder as well..." Returning to the situation, Dr. Honeydew threw out the useless form and took out a new one, checking this time to make sure that he was using a _regular_ pen. Poised to take notes at a millisecond's notice, the Doctor asked, "Why do you require (insert x variable)?"

I cast a wary look at Dr. Strangepork, who was looking at me almost the same way. If the demonstration of Dr. Honeydew and Beaker was any indication, it was probably Strangepork who had the_ real_ brains in this room. I'd have to carefully judge how much I could lie in front of him. "We're concerned consumers," I offered. Fozzie, taking the hint, nodded enthusiastically.

"Yes. Very concerned, and very consumer-ish," he agreed, replacing his hat.

"Mm-_hm_," Dr. Honeydew checked, writing it down. I chanced a careful look at Dr. Strangepork, but he didn't seem suspicious in the least, even at Fozzie's rather shaky concurrence. I began to feel slightly easier now—until Dr. Honeydew got to the next question. "Why _are_ you concerned?"

"I—" I fumbled, trying to think something up, "I—I—I—"

The Dr. Strangepork was now considering me rather oddly. "Have you contracted a disease of the voicebox?" he asked, pulling down his glasses only to push them up his snout again. "That sounds like the symptoms of the rare virus Raposicus Joesium!"

I smiled weakly. "I—I might've gotten something," I tried, attempting to sound casual or even a little sick.

Beaker cried out something in his gibberish from the water cooler in the back, and Dr. Honeydew cocked his head to listen before chuckling a little again. "That's preposterous, Beaky," he chortled, then translated it back to the rest of us while still stifling laughs. "Beaker," he gasped through his giggles, "Beaker thinks that you're trying to make up a story!"

Everyone but me and Beaker collapsed into laughter; even Fozzie was giggling away. I uncertainly joined in, trying to act as genuinely uproared as everyone else. "That's just silly! I was _internally_ coughing, is all, " I protested through a barrage of falsified laughs. That statement, however, had an undesired side effect attached to it.

"Phyllis!" Foz gasped, running over to me. "You really _were_ sick? Why didn't you _tell_ me, oh, this is _awful_, oh—" He wrung his hands in hysteria, and I began to panic myself.

"I'm fine, Fo—Oznowicz," I reassured him awkwardly, gathering myself up. "I was just going to tell the Doctor...why we're concerned consumers." If lying was going to bring me to this point, I might as well give out the truth—as much of it as I could spare, at least. Pulling out the receipt from my trenchcoat pocket, I stated, "I have recently discovered this, Dr. Honeydew." Unfolding it, I read the writing aloud. " 'El Sleezo', 'Muppet Labs', a series of dots, then the number one hundred and fifty with a little dollar sign in front of it." I handed the slip of paper to Dr. Honeydew, who took it and, lifting his own glasses a little, thoroughly inspected it. Beaker, though dripping wet from the stomach down, sidled up behind the Doctor and read over his shoulder. "Do you know anything about this?"

" 'El Sleezo'?" Dr. Honeydew read in puzzlement. "This doesn't sound like any retailer _we_ supply to..." He looked up. "Does it, Julius?"

Dr. Strangepork didn't respond for a second, then jerked to attention. "Oh—no!" he concurred, shaking his head roughly. "No, no it doesn't!"

It was Fozzie's turn to play medic again. "Did _you_ catch that disease, Doctor?" he inquired worriedly, "the...Jackicus Parnellium?"

"Raposicus Joesium," Dr. Strangepork corrected him. "I don't believe so, but you never know."

"The three of us—Oznowicz, myself and my other 'assistant'," I went on, pointedly ignoring them, "think that this El Sleezo place might not be a completely legit store. It's not a solid fact, but that's what we're guessing."

"Oh my," Dr. Honeydew breathed. Beaker chattered something to him, and when Beaker had finished, Dr. Honeydew muttered "Ah, yes..." and turned back to me and Fozzie. "Beaker would like to know where you acquired this receipt." Beaker repeated the statement's syllables triumphantly.

"Not firsthand, I'll tell you that," I explained, trying to think up an excuse. I couldn't tell him that we'd been breaking and _entering_...but what sort of convincing story could I possibly tell? Maybe my uncle had given it to me...or I'd gotten it from a friend...or...

"We found it," Fozzie announced, and I could've slapped myself. Always-misses-the-easy-way-out-Pepper, all right.

Beaker shot off another string of sounds, and we didn't need the Doctor's help to realize that he was asking where, when and the circumstances we found it under. "We found it yesterday," I stumbled. That, at least, was true.

"We were walking home," continued Fozzie, flustering so much that he'd removed his hat again.

"We found it in the gutter."

"This paper isn't wet," commented Dr. Honeydew.

"_Near_ the gutter," I amended.

"We didn't know what to do with it."

"We asked for you at the Theater."

"But you weren't there."

"And one of the officers told us where to find you."

"It was really late."

"So we waited 'till this morning to tell you."

"That's right."

The relay-race storytelling over, Fozzie and I panted for breath. I had to admit, he was a pretty sharp bear when he had his moments. The only problem was, I hadn't seen very _many_ of those moments in the past few days since I'd met him. Looking up at the Doctors and Beaker, I noticed that both Honeydew and Strangepork seemed to accept the explanation—though Dr. Strangepork seemed somewhat relieved—while Beaker just looked defeated. While some sort of silence descended on the group, I stuck in pointedly, "Now that we've given our reasons, may we have a printout of the products?"

"Oh, oh yes of course!" Dr. Honeydew blustered, and began collecting various scraps of paper from around his operating table. "I'll be back in a jiffy," he announced past his pile of documents while teetering dangerously with the weight of the stack. "Come, Beaky." Depositing the extensive pile into the arms of his assistant, Dr. Honeydew breezed out the door with Beaker staggering close behind. Soon enough Fozzie and I shared the empty room with Dr. Strangepork alone.

After a minute or so of complete quiet, Dr. Strangepork looked at the two of us skeptically. "Is that," he asked unobtrusively, "the _whole_ story?"

"It's the truth," I responded, equally guarded. That was at least an actuality; we _had_ found it, we had been _in_ a sewer system (hence the gutter), we _hadn't_ known what to do with it, and we _had_ asked for Dr. Honeydew at the Theater and gotten the reply that he was out. What worried me, though, was that underlying Dr. Strangepork's words was a certain tone of sharpness.

"Ah," the Doctor responded indifferently, then started to stare off into space. After a short while, he asked just as discreetly, "You're a detective? Who are you working for?"

"Me," Fozzie piped up, coming over to stand by me almost defensively. Evidently he had realized the existence of serious, unspoken words beneath this seemingly casual conversation. "Mike Oznowicz. I'm a show biz bear, 'cus someday some TV guy is going to find me at my little sideshow nightclub act and I'll become a big star."

"Is that so." As the Doctor stared off into space again, I started to wonder if I'd just imagined the tension in the room. It certainly seemed that way. I was working too long. Too bad I couldn't take a few weeks in England, work on a jewel robbery and forget all about this business until I'd saved the precious diamond of a fashion designer from being used as a baseball...

"What case are you taking?"

The question from Dr. Strangepork took me completely off-guard. "Huh?" I sputtered, then answered automatically. "Oh, nothing much anymore...like he said, Dr. Honeydew had already solved the murder when I'd gotten there." _Solved_ _to_ him_,_ _maybe_. I was going deeper than Dr. Honeydew had even thought to go, and when I found the answer I'd probably have instigated one of the biggest, most complicated investigations of the history of the detective business.

———

**WALDORF**: Well, the author's already instigating the WORST story in the history of the business!

**STATLER**: Yeah! Fifteen chapters and only a little more than halfway through!

**WALDORF**: What a sap!

**STATLER**: What a blockhead!

**WALDORF**: What a—right behind us!

**STATLER**: Huh? OH NO!

**WALDORF**: HOHOHO! Just kidding!

**THE AUTHOR**: A-heh-HEM.

**WALDORF**: Uh-oh! STATLER, THE AUTHOR'S RIGHT BEHIND US!

**STATLER**: Oh no, you're not getting me with that aga—AAAH!

———

While I inexplicably felt a surge of _overwhelming_ triumph, Dr. Strangepork spoke up again. "So you're that infamous test case," he commented. "Why'd you move to Muppetburg?"

That question was unexpected, so I kind of shrugged and chose a quick answer. "Why not?" Suddenly catching myself in what could have been a deadly mistake, I elaborated. "I don't promote racism. Why can't we just live in harmony? You know, '_walkin'_ _along,_ _singin'_ _a_ _song,_ _side_ _by_ _side_'? I was kind of taking a stand. Plus, I like your kind a _lot_ better than mine, the destructive jerks," I went on, muttering the last half to myself. I surprised _myself_ with that. I hadn't thought that I had really felt so strongly on that matter. I suppose spending the past few days with _real_ friends might have changed me...

The silence grew somewhat awkward after that point, so it was a welcome interruption when Dr. Honeydew bustled back in, Beaker still loaded down with a stack of paper. "See?" he beamed, "back in no time. But there's no possible way for time to halt its flow...so _some_ time passed, but not very much..."

We were spared the lecture as Beaker dumped about half the papers onto the operating table, huffing and gasping. "Ah yes!" Snapping out of his reveries, the Doctor picked up the stack and shuffled the papers around. "Here's the information you requested." Picking up the topmost sheet of paper, Dr. Honeydew read it aloud. " '_For_ _a_ _good_ _time,_ _call_ _Professor_ _Netty_ _Jennings_ _at_'—Oh dear!" he cried out, coming as close as a lime-green Muppet can to reddening all the way up to his ears. "That's—that's the wrong sheet of paper," Dr. Honeydew flushed, hurriedly filing it into some sort of cabinet underneath the operating table. Taking out the _correct_ sheet, Dr. Honeydew read it as if nothing had just happened. "Here's the current list of products, from Muppet Labs Action Hero Laser Death Beam™ to Muppet Labs Zebra De-striper™. I hope it will assist you in your search."

"Thank you, Doctor," I nodded, taking the stack, and I began to walk towards the door. But Fozzie had no intention of following.

"Seriously, though," he asked, "where can I get one of those self-destruct neckties?"

Grabbing him by his own non-combustible ascot, I hauled Fozzie out of the office.

* * *

Once we'd successfully left Muppet Labs in one piece (which, let me tell you, took some doing), we headed back to the apartment to study the printout of products for something that could possibly have had some value in an illegal establishment, cost a hundred and fifty dollars, and could prompt The Electric Mayhem to somehow acquire the necessary funds to purchase it. After splitting up the pile, Fozzie and I spent an hour or more trying to narrow down the search, but I wasn't finding anything that fit all of the required criteria. Surely the "Muppet Labs Growth Pills™" weren't anything that could cost a hundred fifty even if Floyd wanted them, and though the "Muppet Labs Robotic Politician™" would fit both the cost and the black market stock, I didn't really think that a hard-rock band would have any interest in changing the government. Heck, even registered _voters_ don't have that sort of interest. Plus, "Muppet Labs Instant Door™" and "Muppet Labs Invisibility-Spray-Squirting Rubber Duckie™"? Good for the common criminal, but those would've been more help to get The Electric Mayhem the cash _necessary_ to buy whatever expensive item they had been looking for.

I was just about ready to start throwing the papers out the window when suddenly a sharp knocking at the door interrupted us. "I'LL GET IT!" Fozzie shouted immediately, rushing over towards the door.

"NO!" I cried back, restraining him by the tie again. "You're not in disguise," I hissed. "At _least_ put the Groucho glasses on!!"

While he was off trying to find his funny frames, I crept cautiously over to answer the door. What if whoever had killed Sam had returned to keep me from finishing the investigation? Or maybe it was the police, and they'd found out that Fozzie was here! Or maybe it was my mother, which was just as bad as all of the above! Tentatively, I reached for the doorhandle, then in one swift motion I threw it open to—

"Brawk bruk brugawk," clucked the chicken sitting on the doorstep.

I really _should_ have known.

"Er..." I tried, "Won't you come in?" Waving it in, I stepped aside.

"Brawk bruk brawk braw!" the chicken answered, sidling through the entrance. As it passed me, I saw the envelope clutched in its mouth. Was it the same chicken who'd pestered me at the Theater when I had been looking for Wayne and Wanda?

As I followed the chicken into the living room, Fozzie emerged from the kitchen with his disguise firmly in place. "Who was it, Phyllis?" he asked, then did a double-take when he saw the chicken. "CAMILLA!" he blurted, running over to it. The chicken observed him unassumingly from the couch it had perched itself on. "Camilla, is that you?" Fozzie cried out, shaking it by the...the closest word I can think of is "shoulders". "Camilla, why are you here?"

Wait...Camilla? That _was_ the one that had followed me before! The Great Gonzo had said so himself! "Brawk bru braaawk?" Camilla inquired of Fozzie, and he straightened up immediately.

"No—no, I don't know you!" he insisted, rolling his hat in his hands. That seemed to be his nervous habit. "I've just seen your act at Mahna Mahna...um, Uncle Henson's Theater."

"Brawk brawk braw, bruk bruk bruk bru braw," Camilla cackled in response, and Fozzie was assuming a sort of impressed-slash-confused look.

"I look like Fozzie Bear?" he repeated honoredly, smoothing down the fur on either side of his face. "That great comedian?"

———

**STATLER**: That's a matter of opinion!

**WALDORF**: That he looks like Fozzie?

**STATLER**: No, that he's a great comedian!

**WALDORF**: That's no opinion, that's a FACT!

**STATLER**: Huh?

**WALDORF**: It's a FACT that he's NOT a great comedian!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: OHOHOHOHO!!

———

Before the chicken could reply, I interrupted. "Wait a minute, Fo—'Mike Oznowicz'." He glanced back up at me, and looking him straight in the eye I asked, "You can speak chicken?"

Fozzie seemed rather taken aback. "Of _course!_" he exclaimed, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "You _can't?_"

I _really_ wanted to roll my eyes. "No, unfortunately."

To Fozzie, this was apparently the perfect opportunity to elucidate for me the context under which this had come to be. "You see," he began enthusiastically, "I've known Rubber Chicken for _years_, and when I went to my first 'Chicken Dance' I found out that Chicken was just kind of a different _dialect_ of Rubber Chicken, so—"

I cut him off. "That could've saved me a _lot_ of trouble," I muttered, then turned back to Camilla. "Sorry for interrupting," I apologized, feeling kind of silly that I was talking politely—not _just_ talking, but doing it _politely_—to a chicken. "Please go on."

"_Brawk_," Camilla began, "braw bruk brawk bru bruk brawk brawk bru brawk."

"What?" Fozzie prompted, then translated for me, "She says she wants to tell us something."

Camilla started shifting around on her perch, and seemed worried. Even with a chicken, body language will tell. "There's nothing to be frightened of," I coaxed, feeling more ridiculous by the second. A distressed chicken was in my apartment, and my illegal roommate was translating an important message for me. Only in Muppetburg.

"Braaw..." Camilla began, then shivered. "Brawk," she clucked, slowly and deliberately, "Brawk brawk braw bruk bruk bruk...brawk."

"Well?" I asked Fozzie expectantly, but then I noticed with alarm that he had turned pale and shaky. "What is it? What did she say?"

"I—" he stammered, scared out of his wits, "I—she—you—oh my goodness!"

I shook him by the shoulders to try and snap him out of it. "What is it? What is it?" When he continued to jabber, I sputtered, "Write it down if you can't say it!"

With quivering hands, Fozzie picked up a pencil and grabbed one of the Muppet Labs product listing sheets. Turning it over, he scrawled on the clean back of it, his handwriting messier than usual as he continued to stare transfixed at Camilla. Without saying a word, he handed it back to me. It took me a minute to decipher the writing, but then there it was, bright as day, and it took special care for me to not start to lose _my_ cool as well.

"_I know who killed Sam the Eagle._"

———

**WALDORF**: Wait a minute...two, three, four, five...There's 10 more chapters after this! How can they figure out who did it ALREADY?

**STATLER**: Huh? Figure out who did what?

**WALDORF**: What do you MEAN, figure out who did what?

**STATLER**: Wait, we're still reading this story? I would've thought we'd have abandoned it by now!

**WALDORF**: Me too, but we're getting our best publicity yet from this!

**STATLER**: What do you mean? We were in every episode of THE MUPPET SHOW!

**WALDORF**: Yeah, but who remembers THAT?

**STATLER**: True...who WANTS to remember it?


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16**: Camilla

We were at _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ within five minutes easy, and after Fozzie had once again turned his charm on Alice we flew up the stairs to the seventh floor. Camilla was tucked protectively in the crook of Fozzie's arm, which I personally considered not exactly the safest place in the world for our valuable informant, but I didn't say anything. For leaving the apartment Fozzie had reobtained his trenchcoat, and without the belt it was flapping wildly in our wake, hitting everyone passing by. Reaching the seventh floor on desperation power alone, we didn't even knock when we reached Kermit's door but burst right in instead.

"Phyllis!" Kermit cried when he saw us. "Foz—" He cut off the second syllable when he saw Camilla, and looking between her and us he demanded, "What's going on?"

"There's no possible way anyone could listen in, right?" I demanded, getting straight to my point. When Kermit failed to reply within two nanoseconds, I pushed, "_Is_ _there?_"

"No, no, no, there isn't!" Kermit flustered, waving his arms wildly in the air. A half-finished story on the physics of sneaking out back windows lie in the paper load of his typewriter. "But what's this all about? What's happening?"

I drew the shades down on Kermit's office window and shut the door very firmly while Fozzie handed Kermit the note he'd scrawled down. Kermit took it in his hands, scanned it with his protrudant eyes, and pretty soon he was just as shaky as me and Fozzie. Looking up, he gulped, "Did the chicken say that?"

"_Camilla_ did," I corrected him as the offended party clucked annoyedly.

Kermit began to shiver, though whether in excitement or fear or both I couldn't tell. "Well?" he insisted. "Who was it? What did she say?"

"We have yet to find that out," I explained, and Fozzie set Camilla down on Kermit's desk. We all huddled around the chicken, Kermit and Fozzie seated on the only chairs and me squatting on the floor—one of the hazards of being the tallest-born species in the room. "Tell us what you know," I ordered the stool chicken. "Bear, you take dictation."

———

**STATLER**: AHAHAH! Stool chicken! OH, that's stellar!

**WALDORF**: Huh? I don't get it.

**STATLER**: Well, you see, it's a STOOL PIGEON, but it's a CHICKEN, and...oh, never mind, it's not that funny.

**WALDORF**: It never is.

———

"Yes, _sir!_" Fozzie chirped back, completely at odds with the circumstances. Being the sunniest of all of us, I shouldn't have been surprised that he'd recovered his mood that quickly. I wouldn't even have been surprised if he'd started cracking jokes and dancing around the room, but thankfully he didn't go _that_ far. Pulling out a clipboard and paper, Fozzie gripped his pencil tightly and waited expectantly while Camilla began her story.

"Brawk..." Camilla started, and Foz immediately started to scribble furiously. I was astounded. Chickens were able to communicate _that_ _much_ in a single syllable? This was a language I had to _learn!_

"What is it?" I demanded wildly, excitement stirring every inch of me. "What have you got?"

"Just a minute..." Fozzie mumbled, his pencil moving faster across the paper than the eye could track, "hold it...hold it...THERE!"

I tore the clipboard out of his hands with a huge demonstration of force and focused my eyes on the piece of paper. I could see it now, it was a full confession, it was—

I stopped stock-still and felt like a total idiot.

"What's wrong, Phyllis?" Fozzie inquired concernedly. "Don't you like the drawing I did of Big Bird?"

———

**STATLER**: Have you realized just how many jokes the author has written in the EXACT SAME FORMAT as that one?

**WALDORF**: What do you mean?

**STATLER**: What do I—...wait a—WHAT'S THAT THING BY YOUR SHOE?!

**WALDORF**: Huh? What?!

**STATLER**: Oh, it's terrible, it's horrendous, it's—

**WALDORF**: —it's a piece of lint.

. . . . . . . .

**WALDORF**: I see what you mean now...

**STATLER**: Huh? What?

———

As I practiced my "watch-me-do-this-and-maybe-you'll-forget-what-a-fool-I-just-made-of-myself" routine, I prompted Camilla to continue. She did so only after taking the most precautions possible to make sure that I hadn't just escaped from an asylum. "Brawk," she began again hesitantly, "bruk bruk braw bru brawk bruk brawk. Braw braw brawk..."

I glanced over Fozzie's shoulder as he took down the notes, and I soon became more immersed in the translation he was copying than in Camilla's actual speech. So while I tuned out to the rest of the world, I just followed along with Fozzie's handwriting as best as I could.

"_It wus 2 days ago on the Day of the murd mu murder, and I wus in my dressing room with all the other chikens. It wus about 5 at night and evuryone was getting ready. I had to use the 'litle chikie's room', so I went out, but then I herd voices from anothere dressing room. So I went to chek it out in case they wus talking about,me. So I went and e eeve ez evv_"

Fozzie paused at this time. "Hey, Kermit?" he asked puzzledly. "How do you spell 'eavesdropped'?"

Camilla clucked guiltily at the word, then spoke up again. "Braw-bruk-bruk-bru-braw-bru-brawk-bru-brawk-bru-bruk-braw."

"Thank you," Fozzie returned, scribbling down the word in the best spelling of it I had ever seen. "Never mind, Kermit."

Kermit glanced over at Fozzie's respelling and whistled in appreciation. "You're very good at spelling, Miss Camilla," he acknowledged, scratching his head. "Care to check over my article for grammatical errors?"

Camilla preened herself and cackled a response, which Fozzie translated back for us. "She says thank you very much, but if you need a secretary ask her friend Carrina. She clucks twenty words a minute, _and_ she likes frogs."

"No thanks," Kermit responded quickly. I hid a grin behind my hand. "We'd just like to hear the end of your story."

"Brawk..." Camilla started again, and Fozzie took down the words once more.

"_Oh well... I lissened at the door of the room and herd 2 people talking. One wus a boy and the other wus a girl._"

Kermit jerked in surprise and _almost_ managed to blush. "If that was the case, she _shouldn't_ have been listening!" he hissed to me concernedly, fidgeting.

"Brawk bru braaaaaaaaw...?"

I straightened back up, my face fire-engine red. "No, we weren't talking about you, Camilla," I explained hastily. "Please keep going."

"Bruk bruk bruk," she bemoaned, but did as I asked.

"_They sounded vary serious, so I thought I shouldn't be lissening. But then I herd 1 of them, the girl, say 'bump him off tonight', and I thought maybe they were going to play shufflebored and that I could play too. But then the boy sed 'what'll we use?' and the girl sed 'a club, a knife, whut do i care?' Then I figgered that they were REALLY serious._"

Camilla paused to take a breath, but I knew that there might be no way for me to breathe again.

———

**WALDORF**: Hooray!! Then we can stop reading this!

**STATLER**: You mean, stop HECKLING this!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: DOHOHOHO!

———

"_So I snuck into the vent ven ven the air vents rite outside the room and I took my camera. Then I went rite up to the screen and took a picture then got out. Here is the pictur._"

After that statement, Camilla pulled out the envelope she'd brought with her and handed it to Kermit with her beak. He took it gingerly and, using his slim fingers, slitted it open. With both me and Fozzie crowding around him, Kermit took a deep breath and pulled a photo out.

I couldn't say anything for a moment, and I knew for a fact that Kermit would go into denial once he'd gotten his wits back. Fozzie, well, _he_ was obviously shocked. The picture was in color, a rare occurrence in Muppetburg. Few people could _afford_ anything better than black-and-white film if they even had the dough to get a camera—unless, of course, they were newspaper photographers. But it wasn't the quality of the photo that got me in shivers, it was the _subject_.

The photograph quite clearly showed Miss Piggy in her dressing room, wearing the same V-necked silver dress she had been in on the night of the murder. She was meaningfully brandishing a very ornately carved table lamp while facing...while facing The Great Gonzo, who was standing before her with his arms outstretched. He was dressed up in the purple tuxedo that he had been wearing during my visit to the Theater when I'd first gone in search of Wayne and Wanda—which, as I recalled with alarm, had been followed up by Gonzo entering Miss Piggy's dressing room with flowers and chocolates. The idea was forming in my head now; Miss Piggy and Gonzo, her suitor, had conspired against Sam the Eagle to get him out of the picture. For what reason I didn't know, but it was an almost certainty that they were the ones who'd killed Sam. It might've been dumb luck that the blame had fallen on Fozzie, or they might've organized it that way since Foz had a very obvious dislike towards Miss Piggy's performing. All thoughts of The Electric Mayhem and their mysterious bill vanished from my mind. That was inconsequential now. I had found the murderers.

Fozzie, however alarmed, was tapping his head with his pencil and muttering to himself. Then looking up, he motioned worriedly for me and Kermit to have a group huddle in the back of the room—without Camilla. "Guys," he whispered urgently once we were well away from Camilla, "I think she's lying."

As shocked as I had been by the picture Camilla had showed us, I was more taken aback by Fozzie's accusation. "What do you mean?" I hissed, pointing to the photo in Kermit's hands. I didn't _want_ to believe that it could have been someone other than Miss Piggy. "It's all right there! What's the problem?"

"It's just," Fozzie struggled, looking around half-guiltily and fiddling with his hat, "well, everyone at Mahna—the Theater knows that Gonzo and Camilla are in love. If he had _really_ done this, Camilla would be covering up for him." He paused, then went on in dislike, "But Miss Piggy...I bet _she_ had something to do with—"

I was just about to agree heartily with him when Kermit suddenly couldn't take it anymore. "No," he insisted. Very uncharacteristically of him he pounded his fist on his chair. "I _won't_ believe it!" he protested, and grabbing his coat he ran out the office door before we could stop him.

"Kermit!" I yelled back, joined in by Fozzie. "Keeeeeeeeeeerr-mit!!"

We were reprimanded by several working writers who wanted peace and quiet, but none of our noise was able to bring Kermit back. He was already to the stairwell and running down, bowling over several people on his way. One of his victims was a young frog, tiny, squat and a deeper shade of green than Kermit. While the kid was rubbing his head and looking back at Kermit, Fozzie and I ran over to the stairwell with Camilla close on our heels. Looking back at us, the little boy asked, "Miss Phyllis? What's wrong with Uncle Kermit? I just wanted to ask him about..."

"Sorry, Robin," I excused Kermit's little nephew, scooting past him and downstairs, "Kermit's busy, you'll have to talk to him later."

While we left Robin puzzled at the top of the flight, Fozzie caught up with me, gasping for breath. "How're we gonna catch up with him, Phyllis? Where's he going?"

"I have a pretty good idea," I panted back as we raced down past the fifth floor, "and if I know our Kermit, he hasn't thought to stop running and catch a cab."

* * *

With the assistance of an illegal lift on the back of a Muppetburg Red Car bus, we made it to Uncle Henson's Theater just before a very out-of-breath Kermit had rounded the block to the nightclub. "Hold up, Kermit!" I called as he came within earshot. "Wait a sec, we'll talk this over _calmly!_"

"I don't," he panted, tired but still with a fire in his ping-pong-ball eyes, "I don't...want to...talk." Scampering past us, he started banging on the door to the main entrance to the Theater. "Let me in!" he cried. "I DEMAND TO SEE MISS PIGGY!"

I tried to restrain his flailing, skinny arms, but he pushed me off with such panicked force that I careened backwards, bumping into Fozzie. Camilla fluttered squawkingly out of his arms, and the two of us crashed into the garbage dumpster in the side alley off the Theater. Its contents spilled all over (as if I hadn't suffered enough) the two of us, and let me tell you that stuff smelled _strong_. Lifting the corner of a banana peel off my face, I groaned. This poor trenchcoat was going to have to get a wash when we got home, if it didn't have to get _fumigated_ before Uncle Deadly would let it in the building. Then I reminded myself that he had a special place in his heart for items of deathness and decay, so I assured myself that he'd at least tolerate it for a while.

"This is worse than the sewer!" Fozzie commented from somewhere to my left. "This stuff is going to stain my fur!"

I looked over at him, decided that he'd be OK struggling out of the refuse on his own and stood back up to try and keep Kermit out of the Theater until I'd had Miss Piggy convicted. Well, I _almost_ stood back up, because my foot slipped on something glossy and smooth and I fell back in a pile of...I _really_ hoped it was mud. Grumbling something I won't transcribe in order to protect the innocence of the readers, I glanced back down at my left foot at what I had skidded on. I had a double-take when I recognized it as a photo of Gonzo. It was a black-and-white print unlike the shot Camilla had shown us, but it clearly had been a high-quality picture until I'd stepped on it. Seeing the luminous white edge of another photo, I uncovered a whole mound of photographs of The Great Gonzo, in several different costumes and poses, obviously taken over a long period of time. One of them had writing on the back, so I flipped that over.

"_Love, Gonzo._"

I was pondering this over when I heard Kermit's fevered knocking stop. Scrambling back to my feet and brushing myself off as best as I could manage, I was just in time to see the Chief, back in uniform, bitterly open the door to Kermit. "_You_ again?!" he cried when he spotted me, but he couldn't get much further than that because Kermit barreled past him into the Theater. Pulling Fozzie up and retrieving Camilla from her haven, I pushed past the stunned Chief after Kermit.

"We really have to stop meeting like this, 'Chief Sweetums'," I took the time to comment sardonically as we passed.

When we reached Miss Piggy's dressing room, Kermit was already inside with Miss Piggy and so, conveniently, was Gonzo. "Miss Piggy, I know it's not true," Kermit was pleading to the porcine diva, kneeling in front of her while she was arranged in a sitting position on her pouf. "You didn't do it, I know you didn't!" Miss Piggy, though visibly delighted by Kermit's proximity to her, didn't appear to know what he was talking about. And Gonzo, well, he was just _there_, in the same purple tuxedo as in the incriminating photograph and clutching another bouquet of flowers.

Stumbling into the room rather dramatically with Fozzie hot on my heels, I shouted (pretty impressively, if I do say so myself), "HOLD IT!"

"P._U_," Gonzo gagged, holding his hooked nose with both hands. "What _smells?_ Have the garbage disposal guys missed the dumpster again?"

Gonzo aside, I stood in the middle of the room until both my intimidating presence and daunting stench called everybody's attention to me. When I was sure that everyone was looking at me, I announced, "Mr. Great Gonzo, _Miss_ Piggy, you two are hearby under arrest for the murder of one Sam the Eagle!"


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**: The Truth of the Suitors

**WALDORF**: Hey Statler, why do they call them "Suitors"?

**STATLER**: Maybe it's because they wear suits.

**WALDORF**: Romeo didn't wear a suit, though.

. . . . . . .

**WALDORF**: By the way, have you seen ROMEO AND JULIET?

**STATLER**: What? No, but they should be here any minute now...

**WALDORF**: You old fool!

**STATLER**: WHAT?

———

"What is _vous_ talking about, Miss Salt?" Miss Piggy demanded, confused but not daunted in the least.

"The question is, Piggy, dearest," Gonzo said, trying to put his arm around her, "what are _you_ talking about?"

"That's what I just _said_, buzzardbeak!" Miss Piggy snapped, brandishing a fist at him until he backed off. Oh, she was putting up a convincing act all right, but I saw right through it. She and Gonzo had planned this whole thing since the beginning.

"Phyllis," Kermit pleaded forcefully, "she didn't do it! She couldn't have! Leave off of her! She had nothing to do with this!"

Miss Piggy turned to Kermit, and she noticeably softened. "Thank you for your valiant defense, _mon_ _capitan_, but _moi_ thinks that she can handle this herself." Turning to me, she growled much more venomously, "Whaddaya want, buster?"

I was beginning to think that this pig had multiple personalities.

"Don't play innocent with me, pig!" I insisted, pointing my finger at her and hoping she might be nearsighted and think it was a gun. With the most self-assurance I had been able to conjure up in a lifetime of Mondays, I began to narrate the tale. "You thought you could hide it, but you were wrong. The Great Gonzo was in love with Camilla, but then fell in love with you, Miss Piggy, and you felt the same. Then you two decided that you deserved _better_ than a little small-town theater like this. You wanted to extend your talents to _human_ cities. But Sam wasn't very lenient with his contract. So, you decided to _truncate_ your affiliation and make your getaway when the cops arrested some poor sap who had nothing to do with it!"

"YEAH!" Fozzie agreed heartily, pointing at them himself. Then he paused. "Phyllis, what does 'truncate' mean?"

"To stop short." I was too _in_ _my_ _groove_, as Floyd would say, to care.

"Oh." Taking a deep breath, Fozzie accused right to Gonzo and Piggy, "Yeah, you were _truncating_ all right!"

Dead silence greeted the libeling. I had expected some sort of denial, or at least for someone to take out a gun and admit to all the charges like the criminals in every one of the _Thin_ _Man_ movies. But instead there was just complete quiet. It was a little awkward after a while, then Miss Piggy broke the silence in the only way _she_ knew how.

"HIIIII-YAH!"

"Oof!" I wheezed as all the air in my lungs went up and out, refusing to take part in such violence. Kermit seemed torn as to who to support. _Serves_ _him_ _right,_ I thought. Fozzie and Gonzo, however, had no such reservations.

"Piggy, my lovely," Gonzo cried, running up to her and trying his best to keep her back. "Piggy, you really _must_ think of your lovely arms!" he insisted. "You'll strain them!"

Miss Piggy responded by elbowing him in the stomach.

"Phyllis, are you OK?" Fozzie yelped, coming over to me. He took off his hat and began fanning me with it for no apparent reason.

"Of course I'm OK," I spat back, glaring daggers at Miss Piggy. "That's only the second time in as many days that she's _attacked_ me."

Finally making a decision, Kermit ran over to Miss Piggy and clutched her arm. "Miss Piggy," he asked, "why do you have to do this? If you're right, violence won't help!"

Miss Piggy simpered and looked into Kermit's eyes. "You are right, my froggy," she crooned before glaring back at me, reciprocating the venom I was shooting at her. "I lost my head because of _her_ accusations of _moi_ being in _love_ with that—that—" Unable to think of an appropriate insult, she went with the most offensive choice she could. "—that _Gonzo!_"

"Piggy!" Gonzo was obviously astounded that such a caustic remark against him could have been voiced by his love. "You mean, you _don't_—"

"What do you _think_, twit?" Piggy hurled right back, catching him with one look the emotional equivalent of one of her karate chops. "As if the number of times I've _bodily_ _thrown_ _you_ _out_ of _moi_'s dressing room isn't enough, try the beating I gave you after that incident at the Christmas show!"

———

**STATLER**: Huh? WHAT incident at the Christmas show?

**WALDORF**: Well, EVERYTHING embarrassing happens at a Christmas show.

**STATLER**: What do you mean?

**WALDORF**: Well, just think of what YOU did at that show last Christmas...heh heh...

———

I was stupefied. "Wait a minute..." I spluttered, wobbling my way back onto my feet.

Miss Piggy didn't give me time to finish my statement, as she simply tossed back her curls and acidly explained, "Firstly, Miss Salt, I have _never_ been in love with that _weirdo_. If you really _thought_ that, your species is obviously as _inferior_ as that annoying Chief of Police is always _saying_. And though I _do_ realize that I have better talent than should be confined to this little one-horse-town, Sam _would_ have let _moi_ off with some..." She blew imaginary smoke off the tops of the knuckles of her left fist. "...shall we say, _persuasion_." She glared right at me again. "But _moi_ is staying right here until _moi_ has gotten a better deal—after all, the most glamorous TV stars were discovered in nightclub sideshows—and in _no_ way, shape or form did _moi_ try to kill Sam."

I was at a loss for words. "But...but..." Thinking logically for once, I pulled out the photographic evidence Camilla had given us and handed it over to Miss Piggy. "This picture of you and Gonzo is proof enough. Explain _that!_"

Staring over her shoulder at the picture, Gonzo's eyes widened. "Wow, that _is_ a good picture!" he appreciated. "It shows off your romantic side, Miss Piggy."

Without even looking up, the pig reached upwards and twisted Gonzo's nose before looking back at me.

"_Vous_ really _fell_ for this, Miss Salt?" she accused heartlessly, then strutted over to a wastebasket in the corner. She dug through it wildly, throwing things this way and that.

"Like a pig in mud," I muttered to Fozzie.

Miss Piggy turned instantly. "_What_ _did_ _you_ _say?_"

"Nothing!!" I hurriedly assured her, fearing for my life if I answered wrong.

As Miss Piggy "humph"ed and continued digging through the trash, I spotted a movement out of the corner of my eye and realized that Camilla was trying to make a break for it. "Fozzie!" I cried before I could remember myself, but he had already scooped up the errant chicken and restrained her from escaping. She fluttered and clucked, but no matter how she struggled he didn't let her free. His eyes widening, Gonzo recognized her, apparently for the first time since we'd arrived.

"Camilla?" he asked breathlessly. Camilla covered her face with her wings and turned her head away from Gonzo and into the protection of Fozzie's coat. Thankfully, his reaction to Camilla's presence had immediately erased the memory of my outburst from both their minds. "Cam—" the lousy romancer tried again, but Miss Piggy cut him off as she stomped over to me and handed me a fistful of crumpled-up photographs. She didn't seem to have heard any of it.

"Here," she grunted. "These are the _rest_ of those photographs. They _were_ taken on the night..._it_ happened...but _moi_ had been setting up a camera so I could take _beaut-ti-ful_ pictures of _moi_self to send to prospective _employers_. But _buzzardbrain_ here"—she jerked a none-too-kind thumb at the still shell-shocked Gonzo—"went into my room just as _moi_ finished setting up the twelve-frames-a-minute automatic feature."

I grudgingly took the pictures from her and flipped through them with Fozzie and Kermit hawking over my shoulder. As much as I hated to admit it, it was a shot-by-shot sequence of Gonzo entering Miss Piggy's room with his arms outstretched, followed by Miss Piggy brandishing a conveniently-located table lamp and throwing it at him, directly followed by Gonzo's retreat from the room. The picture we had received had fit somewhere in the middle of that chronology. So she _hadn't_ been suggesting to kill Sam after all in that picture. But my bitter resentment towards the pig wouldn't let me give in without a fight. "Well then," I challenged, "if you're so certain, why don't you tell me what _did_ happen on the night Sam was killed?"

"Phyllis..." Kermit admonished, but Piggy smiled sweetly at him.

"Never worry, _mon_ _capitan_," she cooed. I was ready to retch at a second's notice. "I'll _prove_ my claim." Turning back to me, she inhaled deeply and started to talk.

"On...that night, my act of singing 'I'm Gonna Always Love You' hadn't gone over very well with the band. That nasty Floyd Pepper, especially." She grunted again, and scowled when she said the name. "He actually had the, the _chutzpah_ to go up to me and, and to _tell_ me just what he thought of that number! Then I of course gave him my best shot and he wobbled away without another word."

———

**WALDORF**: "CHUTZPAH"? Who says CHUTZPAH anymore?

**STATLER**: You have the chutzpah to ASK that?

———

I was forced to interrupt at that point. "Listen, Miss Piggy," I interjected, "I...eh, _know_ Sergeant Pepper. I doubt that a singular barrage, even from _you_, would hardly make _him_ back down."

Miss Piggy was unfazed. Leaning in to me, she muttered, "You gotta know where to _aim_, sweetheart." She lowered her eyes meaningfully. "Need a demonstration?"

"No thanks." I think I'd gotten the message.

"Anyways," she went on, stepping back away from me and towards her pouf, "when Floyd left, I went over to Sam's office to ask where he'd left Foo-Foo, _moi_'s dog that _moi_ had asked him to take care of while I was rehearsing my act. You see, Foo-Foo was always _dreadfully_ underfoot when I was singing. But his office door was locked, so I...aheh...listened at the keyhole. He was talking to that Fozzie Bear guy about the flaws in his act, so I thought '_That's_ gonna take a while' and I left." She paused, tilting her head to the side in remembrance. "You know, I never _have_ found out just where Foo-Foo is..."

"The _story_," Fozzie urged. You could tell that he hadn't liked that remark about his act.

"Don't rush me," Miss Piggy growled threateningly, then as Fozzie cowered back (still clutching Camilla), she _did_ continue. "So, I looked for the sheet music for the song _moi_ had done—not that _moi_ had forgotten the words, of course, _moi_ NEVER forgets the words—but I could not find it. Then I remembered that our 'dear' Sergeant Floyd and his barbaric musicians had had the music because, of course, _they_ were the ones who had to _play_ it. At first I decided that maybe I'd just start learning one of my _other_ songs instead...'What Now My Love', 'Never Before and Never Again', 'Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better'...which of course _moi_ CAN, but _moi_ was talking about the song." She took a deep breath and proceeded. "But _moi_ could not forget the music for _moi_'s other number. So, I decided to go to the dressing room Floyd had with his groupies and demand the music back in exchange for sparing pain—all very gracefully, of course, aheheh." Pausing for a second to collect her thoughts (at this point, I wondered if she _had_ any that didn't revolve around _herself_), Miss Piggy went on tentatively and perhaps with a little anxiety. "So, _moi_ went over to their room, and I was about to rush up and knock the door in when Floyd and those others, Zoot, Dr. Teeth, Janice, that _dreadful_ 'Animal', came _out_. The lights were out in the hall, so they didn't see me. They were talking in low voices, so I knew something was up, and I slipped around the corner before they spotted me. I didn't hear much when they passed, except for 'the Eagle' and 'tonight'. I followed them after they passed me.

"They were heading towards the main rooms, you know, where the important things are like the food and the bathrooms? And a clock went off, making...um...I think it was one o'clock. Then I started to wonder why the musicians were still in the Theater this late. _Moi_, of course, had just been thinking on her feet when _moi_ had though that they'd be in their dressing rooms, and _moi_ hadn't known the time."

"What happened then?" I pressed, but I was afraid to know the answer.

"_Moi_ lost them," Miss Piggy admitted, hanging her head embarrassedly. "It _was_ very dark. You see, we always turn the hall lights down when the show's over so we can save on electricity." Over her embarrassment, Miss Piggy straightened again. "_Moi_ waited for a few minutes to see if they would come back, but then _moi_ heard Hilda scream and call the police. Of course _moi_ was worried, and _moi_ ran to the upstairs rooms where _moi_ lives. On my way up, birdbeak Gonzo here sticks his head out and yells 'Did somebody _die?_' " She shot a nasty glare at Gonzo. "Naturally, _moi_ ignored him and ran to _moi_'s room and locked the door. Mere, mere _minutes_ later sirens came and I heard policemen knock on the door across the hall from mine and yell for that Fozzie Bear. Peering _very delicately_ through the keyhole, I saw a lot of cops around the door talking to him and saying he...killed Sam. He told a joke to them, and escaped while they tried to get over the bad comedy. Then one of those officers, some half-wit called Beauregard, came in and asked for me to come downstairs. I _could_ have resisted him, but I did not want a blemish on _moi_'s record." She heaved in a mighty breath, having concluded her story. "And that's all I know."

"If _that's_ all you know," Fozzie cracked thoughtlessly, "you should try going to _school._"

He instantly regretted the joke as Miss Piggy made a merciless high-heeled dent in his unprotected foot.

I looked over to Gonzo, but he didn't look like he was in any condition to tell his version of the night. So I drew my own conclusion. "Then, if Gonzo could have called to you from his room, he couldn't have been downstairs at the time of the murder."

"Unfortunately," Miss Piggy sighed, tossing back her curls, "he cannot be blamed for the murder for such reasons. He did not pass me on the stairs, and _vous_ must have seen that there are no ladders, or room for any, outside." Pausing for reflection, as if tottering on the edge of a decision, she finally burst out with another confession. "But the thing is, if buzzardbeak gets off on that charge, Fozzie must have been innocent on the same counts. He most certainly could not have gotten past _moi_ in the halls, and he had been in his room at least since _moi_ had come running."

Though she was finished, by no means was I. "If you knew this," I stated carefully, trying my best to avoid upsetting her, "why didn't you tell the police that Fozzie was innocent? It would have saved a lot of trouble..." ..._And_ _kept_ me _out_ _of_ _this_ _whole_ _mess_. "You pushed me out of your dressing room when I asked you about Sam."

Miss Piggy stared at me. "Of _course_ I did!" she protested indignantly, and self-consciously I got ready to guard my stomach with my fists. "What, me tell _you_ that I knew something about this," she went on as if it was _that_ obvious, "and have a spot on _moi_'s record for the rest of _moi_'s life? I may be a _marvelous_ songbird, but never will _moi_ be recorded as a _stool_ _pigeon!_"

I sighed and rolled my eyes, but only when I was sure that she wasn't watching. For perhaps the first time since his official meeting with her, though, Kermit sided with me over Miss Piggy. "Phyllis is right, Miss Piggy," he asserted timidly. When the pig turned to him in surprise, he proclaimed rather stunningly, "It doesn't matter what others think of _you_, just that you're saving an innocent."

There was a silence dense with thoughts, broken only by Gonzo and then very hushedly. "But Camilla...why did Camilla say it was us?"

Camilla hid her face from him, and Fozzie timidly patted her on the head. Taking in a shuddering breath and feeling like a snobbish hypocrite, I filled in the blank spots as best I could manage. "Gonzo," I imparted, "that was _your_ fault." While he continued to look at me in disbelief, I went on. "You and Camilla were in love, and she was so star-struck with you that she had a whole photo collection dedicated solely to you. But then your eye began roving towards Miss Piggy."

Gonzo's mouth moved wordlessly in attempted protest, but then his head dropped as he felt the weight of that truth. "Camilla didn't realize that Miss Piggy was less than acceptive of your adoration, and thought that you didn't love her anymore," I continued. "She threw out all the pictures she had of you, and began to avoid you. Then she heard of the murder, and at some point somehow managed to salvage this picture of you two. She was so mad at Miss Piggy for stealing you away, and at you for abandoning her, that she decided to frame you two for the murder." Beginning to digress, I started to think out loud again. "You know, there was a _Thin_ _Man_ movie with almost that _exact_ same plot..."

Gonzo just shook his head in disbelief. His thoughts were his own, and I have no idea what he might have been thinking. All I knew was that it was rather ironic that two romances—or a romance and an _almost_ romance—were both taken away by Miss Piggy. But I knew better than to say that aloud.

"I knew it all along, though," Kermit was informing Miss Piggy over at the side. "I knew you were no killer. A little _rough_, maybe, but not a murderer."

"Oh, Kermy..." she sighed right back, and I had to try and block their voices from my mind before I snapped from the sickening mushiness. But as I turned back to Gonzo, Camilla and Fozzie, I realized that this situation wouldn't be much of a reprieve from the other. Gonzo and Camilla were still quietly in their own worlds, and Fozzie was just there. Just there, that is, until he started patting Camilla proprietarily.

"Don't worry, Camilla," he consoled the chicken, smoothing down her feathers. "If Gonzo tries to hurt you again, I'll protect you." I was wondering if he'd lost his mind, especially when he started cradling Camilla like a baby. "I'll tell you all my greatest jokes! In fact—"

"Don't you _dare!_" Gonzo cried as Camilla started squawking. As inflamed as I'd ever seen him, he knocked Fozzie down to the floor. Retrieving Camilla, he hugged her close to him. "Aw, Camilla, don't worry, _he_ won't bother you." Casting a singularly detestable look at Fozzie, Gonzo cooed to her, "_He_ won't be telling you any of his so-called 'jokes'!"

———

**WALDORF**: If only someone would protect US from the bear's comedy!

**STATLER**: Well, even if we were qualified to have to be helped across the STREET, I don't think there's anything in the Frog Scout manual for HIM.

**WALDORF**: They ought to write a supplement edition: "How to Avoid Bad Comics".

**STATLER**: ..."And How to Heckle Them".

———

As aggravated as Gonzo, but for different reasons, I scrambled over to Fozzie while he tried his best to sit up again without losing his disguise. "You—you blockhead! Have you gone out of your _mind?_" I barked—once again, pardon the species barrier. "What were you _thinking_—"

Before I could finish snapping at him, Fozzie raised himself up on his elbows and without saying a word halted my accusations. Tapping me on the shoulder and grinning almost from ear to ear, he directed my gaze by looking pointedly at the reunited Gonzo and Camilla. They were hugging and sighing and generally carrying on, whereas a moment ago they had been sad and dejected. Fozzie had intentionally provoked Gonzo to force them to make up! "Fozzie..." I breathed, hardly believing what I had seen. "You..."

"Who now?"

Miss Piggy interrupted my little sentimental moment rather forcefully, and with a question I'd have sooner left unanswered. "I...I was just thinking about what you had said," I stuttered, standing up hurriedly. "How Fozzie Bear couldn't have possibly killed Sam."

"Yeah," Fozzie piped up, still on the floor. "And _I_ know that for certain!"

I shot a look at him. Even though I had been thoroughly impressed with his patching up of Gonzo and Camilla's relationship, he had no business practically carrying around a sign saying "Escaped Murder Suspect In Disguise Here". I inhaled deeply, and as I felt Kermit's eyes burning a hole in me I knew what I had to do. It would be humiliating, and I wasn't sure if I would ever be fortunate enough to forget it, but I extended a hand towards Miss Piggy and said my dreadful piece. "Miss Piggy...Gonzo..." I looked down at the floor and turned bright red. "I'm sorry that I thought you'd killed Sam."

Miss Piggy looked at my outstretched hand like she didn't know what she was supposed to do with it. Nudging her, Kermit just reached up and placed Miss Piggy's right hand in mine, forcing her to shake. "Er...thank you," Miss Piggy muttered, turning her head to the floor as well. I suspected that she was unused to people apologizing to her _before_ she forced them into it through physical interference.

Beaming, Kermit stood up straight as my hand and Miss Piggy's dropped back to our sides. "There we go!" he commended. "Now that wasn't so bad, was it?" When awkward silence descended again, he suggested, "Hey listen, why don't we all go out to lunch together?"

I was wondering how we were going to pay for all these ordered-out meals when Miss Piggy declined for me. "I'm truly sorry, frog of my heart," she sighed petitely, "but _moi_self and the other Theater workers are unable to leave this place until the culprit is caught." In true swinelike fashion, she snorted. "Two days of the Swedish Chef's cooking and counting. I hope they get that bear soon."

"Or whoever else it might've been," I added. But Kermit's face had fallen so far at Miss Piggy's response that I knew my first priority would have to be getting him out of the pit of despair by getting him to think of something else. "But Kermit," I pointed out, "_you_ have to get back to the _Times_ before they see that you've gone missing. You just dashed out of there without a word, no 'field research' grant from Mr. Zealand or nothing."

Starting in fear, Kermit jumped and clapped his hand on top of his spade-shaped head. "Oh my GOSH!" he shouted, running for the dressing room door as fast as his spindly legs could carry him. He only just paused long enough to call back "Goodbye, Miss Piggy!" before his fevered footsteps ventured so far out of range that they were unhearable. Perfectly audible, however, was the _oof_ of Chief Sweetums after Kermit bowled him over again. I smirked to myself. We were a regular thorn in the force's side, all right.

"Er...excuse me, Miss Salt?"

It was Miss Piggy. "Yes?" I answered as graciously as I could.

Toeing the carpet, Miss Piggy mumbled, "Ah...when _vous_ has a chance, since _vous_ is a detective, could you, eh...find my Foo-Foo?"

I was a bit surprised, but hid it as well as I could. "I'll try, Miss Piggy," I replied truthfully. "But sometime when I'm not trying to solve a murder." I'd charge her later, when she was ecstatic over the recovery of her dog.

Fozzie tugged on my trenchcoat then, and I looked down. He hadn't gotten up yet. "Phyllis," he asked as I held out a hand to help him up, "shouldn't we follow him?"

I hoisted him to his feet and steadied him as he started to lose his balance. "You follow him," I instructed, pushing him out the door. Camilla and Gonzo were right behind us, walking together. Miss Piggy immediately closed the door as soon as we were all out.

Fozzie stopped in the middle of the hallway. "Wait wait wait wait wait..." he muttered, pressing his paws to his temples before looking back upwards to me. "What do you mean, _I_ follow him? What about _you_?"

"There's something I want to check out..." I explained, thinking at the same rate my mouth was working. I looked back at him, and with a small stab of guilt I noticed how forlorn my words seemed to make him. "I won't be long," I assured him, feeling like I was talking to a six-year-old. Well, at heart, maybe I was. "Besides, Kermit will need help trying to think up an excuse in case he's caught, and you can help him!"

Fozzie's face brightened like the sun. "OK, Phyllis!" he cried out, and began to skip merrily down the hall. I watched him go, then called out a suggestion.

"Avoid the Chief—he's probably _hopping_ mad now if Kermit stepped on his foot!"

Giving a silly grin, Fozzie burst out laughing. "Oh, that's a good one!" he gasped, wiping tears out of the corners of his eyes.

———

**WALDORF**: The question is, tears of JOY or tears of PAIN?

———

"Better hurry," I called to him as he started running again, " 'cus I think Kermit forgot about the bus again!"


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18**: A Few Clues and Not Much Else

I had been thinking very hard about the investigation I'd conducted so far, and had realized that there was one very vital place that I had never examined: Sam's office, the scene of the crime. Only as I reached it with directions from another hillbilly—a green-skinner with raggedy _blonde_ hair masking his eyes and a very protrudant lower tooth—did I figure out why I hadn't investigated it before.

There was a line of police tape all across the doorway.

———

**WALDORF**: THAT'D make it kind of hard to get in!

**STATLER**: I was about to say that!

**WALDORF**: Well, you know what they say about "great minds thinking alike".

**STATLER**: ...If YOURS is a great mind, they must've lowered THOSE standards.

_WHUMPH._

———

Though the door was open, the entire way was blocked by the tape. And that was a sure sign that Chief Sweetums had probably been patrolling it when I'd visited for the first time. Looking around, I satisfied myself once again that no one was watching and carefully stepped over the police tape.

Something seemed wrong the second I entered the room, and after some thinking and head-banging I figured out what it was—the place had no aura of an investigated crime scene. The rest of the Theater, well, everything just looked overly-polished and overly-...overly-_normal_. You could really tell that someone had taken the place apart, analyzed every piece and painstakingly replaced it. There was no feel of that _here_. The cramped room was only very dimly lit through a large window, and the haphazard wads of paper scattered around the vicinity of the wastebasket made the place look as if Sam had only just left and was going to come back any minute now. The patriotic posters littering the walls obviously hadn't been moved since the eagle had first proudly tacked them up, the unruly filing cabinets were still covered with documents and, well, it looked like _my_ office probably did at that very moment. I felt a little guilty that I hadn't stopped in there for a couple days, even though I had a case that was bigger than the rest of the Muppetburg combined. I sighed. If I was lucky, maybe no one had come while I was gone, and then when I was able to return I would get fifty cat cases...nothing more like the one Fozzie had entered my office to bring in...

Something clicked audibly in the back of my mind, and I stood straight up again. Fozzie's case...I'd been so concerned about Sam's murder that I'd forgotten about Fozzie's own initial visit to me. But there was something he'd said during that conversation that day—_"Sam_ _doesn't_ _act_ _like_ _he_ _notices_ _that_ _we,_ _the_ _rest_ _of_ _his_ loyal _performers,_ _are_ _getting_ _paid_ less _and_ less. _Wayne_ _and_ _Wanda,_ _on_ _the_ other _hand—see,_ _not_ _this_ _hand_ _but_ _the_ other _one—keep_ _getting_ _more_ _money_._"_ Wayne and Wanda had already confessed that Sam _did_ pay them more than the other performers, but they hadn't stated it like they had a steadily increasing paycheck...so if Fozzie hadn't exaggerated—

———

**STATLER**: —something that doesn't happen often—

**WALDORF**: —like him being FUNNY—

———

—then I might just have the answer to why Sam had been killed.

I went straight up to the former eagle's desk, where all the most recent-looking papers were located. I noticed with some dismay that someone—a non-professional or someone in a hurry, by the looks of it—had been rifling through it before me and after Sam. The stuff I was looking for might have already been taken! But I went through the papers anyways, taking great care not to leave any fingerprints. Though Wayne had said very truthfully to me that Muppets didn't keep track of balances, I reckoned that Sam would have. Even with less than one hour's worth of experience to fall back on, I had deduced the level of his devotion to America and culture quite easily. He must have been level-headed enough to at _least_ have kept some sort of record for himself...

After many false starts and mistakes, I eventually found them in the bottom of the lower left-hand drawer in Sam's wooden desk. Breathlessly I flipped through them, looking for the updates since Wayne and Wanda had joined the troupe a month ago. They were very neatly written and easy enough to follow, and so I could see very clearly how the budding singers had gotten a raise the first week of performing while their coworkers remained just above minimum-wage level. Then things got interesting as I saw that from the immediately following week to the most recent payday Wayne and Wanda's earnings had stayed level while everyone else's declined steadily. By last week's account, the non-Wayne-and-Wanda performers were all lucky that they were still above _poverty_. My only question was, where was all this money going?

I scrambled furiously through the rest of the papers on his desk in search of an answer, but came up with none. This was irritating. For a fleeting moment I was sorry that I'd sent Fozzie after Kermit, because Foz had an eye for important items as he had displayed when he'd found the receipt in The Electric Mayhem's room. Only for a fleeting moment, though, because as I slumped behind the desk in frustration I saw something starkly white hidden beneath the desk.

Excitedly, I investigated further and found ripped-up scraps of what looked like three different things, all stashed where common passerby wouldn't find it if they even got in. Very painstakingly gathering up all the scraps, I started to patiently try piecing together the articles from the scraps.

I finished first with a very red-white-and-blue brochure, proudly proclaiming on the first page "**P**atriotic **A**mericans' **C**harity **H**eralding **A**merica's **L**oving **A**mericans **F**or **A**ctions of **K**indness and **A**mericanity", or "P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A." for short. Very carefully putting together the second page, I read about P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A.'s benefits of joining, which included "knowing that America would be proud of you" and also having your name forever engraved on a five-year-old's reproduction of the painting of Washington crossing the Delaware. The weekly magazine included reprinted a.k.a. made up interviews with Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt and other notable Presidents, along with P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A.'s gardening-and-housekeeping supplement magazine. Joining was free, but you were expected to donate at least _something_ to their latest fundraiser. It seemed to me like a group of posers—but maybe not so to Sam, because he was obviously a member.

Glancing anxiously at the door, I started work on the next sheet of paper, which was obviously some sort of letter from the same group because "P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A." was emblazoned all across the top. This one took a little longer; I hoped that Kermit and Fozzie weren't waiting for me. But eventually I reconstructed the whole thing out of the scraps. Reading through the whole thing, I didn't learn much.

"Mr. Eagle,

Thank you very much for your contribution to P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A.'s drive supporting the charity "**D**edicated to **U**nfortunate **N**on-Muppets' **G**ood-fellowship" (Abbv. "D.U.N.G."). You are always a substantial giver to good causes, but you have truly outdone yourself this time. In commemoration of your frequent gracious donations, we at P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A. would like to offer our foremost thanks and send you an authentic bootleg of the original Abraham Lincoln stovepipe hat,

-P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A."

Not much to hear in that, except that whoever had though of the acronym D.U.N.G. was either a total idiot or was just completely ignorant of what he was doing.

———

**WALDORF**: If THAT'S the case...Hey Statler, are you sure YOU didn't have a hand in D.U.N.G.?

**STATLER**: Why, certainly NOT! I may be unclean, but THAT'S just RUDE!

**WALDORF**: ...

———

So, feeling even more paranoid that I was going to be caught, I started to piece together the last, and thankfully smaller, piece of paper.

After five more minutes of solid work, I was astounded to see that it was a check, written out to D.U.N.G. via P.A.C.H.A.L.A.F.A.K.A. and signed and sealed by Sam. And for a pretty large amount, too. Those "unfortunate non-Muppets" mentioned in the charity drive would've been pretty affluent if that check had actually made it into the mail before it had been torn to shreds. But the number...with a jolt I pulled out the monetary records I had found in Sam's desk. If he had been able to mail that check, it would have corresponded with last week's payday...

With a little bittersweet smirk I noticed that my hunch had been correct. The number of dollars on this check was _exactly_ the collective number missing from the Theater performers, sans Wayne and Wanda. So if the checks to D.U.N.G. had been in increasingly large amounts, then _that_ was why the performers' paychecks had also steeply dropped every week. Fozzie only noticed Wayne and Wanda being paid "more and more" because they had a steady amount of money for their wages and it was actually _his_ that kept _dropping_. So it was just "more and more" compared to him and his colleagues. Meanwhile, the money missing from his employees' pockets was going steadily to various charities as supported by the **P**atriotic **A**mericans' **C**harity **H**eralding **A**merica's **L**oving **A**mericans **F**or **A**ctions of **K**indness and **A**mericanity, most prolifically at the moment D.U.N.G. And he hadn't had to take it from his employees before, because before Wayne and Wanda appeared he hadn't had to pay for damage to props and stage. So Fozzie had no money with Sam's quiet "borrowing" _combined_ with his own destruction of Theater property. One mystery solved. But that didn't seem to be enough of a critical reason for someone to have killed him, unless...

My stomach lurched again. Floyd and the rest of The Electric Mayhem had reportedly been Sam's biggest enemies, and they had been witnessed going towards Sam's office mere minutes before the murder—and then they hadn't returned to or _been_ returned to Uncle Henson's Theater when the police had rounded up all the employees. And according to Dr. Teeth, they had been so-called "jamming" at the time that the cops were out recalling everyone. Taking into consideration musician slang, "jamming" could mean anything from playing their instruments to washing their socks—to running from the scene of a crime.

I very carefully gathered up the scraps of paper and stuffed them in my trenchcoat's pocket, right next to the receipt from Floyd's room at The Happiness Hotel. As I did that, I realized with growing dread that I still smelled like an ancient fruitcake. I wouldn't be able to sneak around anywhere without alerting someone with my overpowering stench. I had only been able to ignore it because my nostrils had gotten used to it, what with the greater portion of my attention having been devoted to accusing Miss Piggy and Gonzo of murder. I groaned. First Floyd, now those two. Would I ever stop with my incorrect charges and find the _real_ murderer?

While I bemoaned my bad fortune and equally bad stench, I stumbled over to the window in hopes of opening it and escaping both before I stopped short. The window was already open, and looked as if it had been for days. The curtains were certainly flapping freely enough with the wind...and to indicate that the unshutting had been for a greater purpose than for show. I rushed over to it, and realized that my hunch had been correct—the window was easily openable from the outside, and _had_ been unlocked from that position. Someone had used this window as an entrance and maybe even an escape route, and that on the night of the murder.

My eyes open now, I began to scan the room for more clues before hitting on one. One of the filing cabinets by that selfsame window was crooked and leaning against the cabinet next to it. That couldn't have been managed by Sam alone, even if he'd had some reason for tilting the cabinet. Something either bigger or stronger must have done that, somehow knocking it over and repositioning it as best as they could. The marks on the carpet were enough testimony for that. Looking around some more, there was no sign of a struggle of any sort—except for an overturned potted plant lying on the floor. It was clearly only mildly disturbed, so it couldn't have been by whatever had knocked over the filing cabinet, but there _was_ signs of people by it: two pale blue feathers of Sam's and a single strand of coarse fur. Leaning over the window and into the light, I was about to determine the color it was—

"Pepper! What're you doing in here?"

I was so startled by the unexpected voice from the door that I dropped both the feathers and the fur sample out the window, where before I could grab them they were whisked away by the wind. Whirling around in both frustration and dread, I saw the Chief looking right at me with shocked surprise and malice all over him.

"Checking out the scene of the crime," I replied, forcing myself to relax. He couldn't hurt me; the mayor protected me from police force brutality because of my status as a test case in Muppetburg.

Growling something fierce, Chief Sweetums held up the line of police tape. "See this?" he rumbled. "It says, 'Police Line, Do Not Cross'. Now as stuck-up as your race may be, they can still _read_."

I smiled widely. "Well then, it's good for you that I'm not Christian. I don't believe in a 'holy cross'."

———

**WALDORF**: AAAAAAH!!

**STATLER**: WHEN WILL THE PUNS STOP?!

———

The Chief groaned and buried his head in his hands. "Have you ever seen that 'Fozzie Bear' perform? Because that's _exactly_ the kind of terrible joke he uses."

Maybe I _had_ been hanging out with Fozzie too much... "Anyways, if you had a police line stretched across this office," I challenged, "then how come it hasn't been inspected yet? Those forensics should have seen this, but this office has been untouched by police hands. Shouldn't this have been the first place they checked out?"

Even beneath his amazingly bushy black eyebrows, I could see his eyes widen. "They _didn't?_" he roared, once more showing me how amazingly sharp his lower-lipped fangs were. "Those _amateurs_," he cursed. "I _told_ them, but _noooooooo_, they were acting practically _human_ on me!" The last comment, I knew, was directed right at me. If he only knew that Sam gave to charities supporting those humans the Chief detested so much.

"I'm afraid I'll be forced to take my leave of you now," I replied, shoving my hands in my pockets as an excuse to make sure that I still had all those scraps in there. It wouldn't do for the Chief to spot those and accuse me of removing evidence from the scene of the crime. "I've seen all I need to see."

Coming as close as he could to bodily shoving me out of the room, the Chief ushered me past the police line. "That's why there's a police line over it," he growled. "To keep 'private detectives' _out_."

When I was successfully away from the Chief, I sighed with relief. Maybe he'd made me lose the fur sample, but at least he'd let me find two important clues: that the murderer had been strong enough to topple a full filing cabinet, and that there had been at least one other person around who had knocked down the potted plant. And aside from all that, I could actually tell Fozzie why his paycheck had slowly been dwindling. Not that it would matter in the current circumstances, but as the old saying goes, there are only two certainties in the world: death, and Muppets.

* * *

I met up with Kermit and Fozzie at _The_ _Muppetburg_ _Times_ building again, where after another haggle with Alice I eventually got myself signed in as a visitor. Though I was in a sore mood from having to deal with her, when I reached Kermit's office I could tell that he'd had a rougher time of it. His green skin was drawn, and he typed at his desk with more of an air of a punished child than a happy frog. Even Fozzie seemed affected by this atmosphere, for once quiet and bleak. It didn't look like such a good situation, and as I sat myself down between the two of them Kermit turned to me and explained just how bad it really was.

"Mr. Zealand threatened to fire me if I ran off like that again," Kermit sighed, still typing. "Well actually," he amended, "one of his rat messengers threatened that Mr. Zealand would fire me, but it's the same thing..." Kermit turned to Fozzie with an outstretched hand, and Foz put a clean sheet of paper in it as Kermit ripped up the piece that was already sticking out of his typewriter.

"That's _terrible_," I protested, though in my mind I was secretly thinking that the editor had been right, considering that Kermit's "heroic dash" had been to save "_her_" pigskin. But if I told Kermit that, the situation would only run further downhill.

"It's Camilla's fault," Fozzie cut in, trying to help the issue. "She's the one who came in and—and _lied_," he insisted. "So _there_." The last phrase, while a bit childish, _did_ actually give his little speech the impressive ending note it needed.

Kermit sighed and shook his head. "The funny thing, though," Kermit commented almost pitifully, "is that Mr. Zealand never used to be _like_ that. He used to be happy-go-lucky all the time, just thinking of himself and his fish. He'd never have taken that sort of action on my leaving if he had even _noticed_. But now..."

"And all this started around six months ago, when he stopped coming out of his office," I concluded for Kermit.

"That's right," he agreed, and started to type halfheartedly on his article before shoving it aside. "Oh, it's no use," he moaned, and ripped it apart again. He slumped on his desk, and he obviously needed cheering up pronto.

"Oh, Kermit," I remarked, trying to pick a topic that would lift his spirits, "Robin was looking for you, but you missed him. I think he wanted to tell you something."

"Robin was by?" Kermit sat up, startled, and I was ready to congratulate myself. Kermit was certainly enraptured with his young nephew, and news that he had been at the office for him was probably the best news he'd heard since Sam's murder had been reported and all this madness had started. "I _missed_ him? Why didn't you tell me?"

"Wait wait wait..." Foz muttered, his hand on his forehead in thought. "Was that the little guy we saw after Kermit ran out?"

With the reminder of his folly brought up, Kermit slumped down again. I realized that it wasn't Fozzie's fault, but he hadn't really had to go to that subject again. "Aw, cheer up, Kermit," I insisted for lack of a better phrase, and patted him on the back. "Things aren't as bad as they—"

Before I could finish my sentence the door flew open, and standing in the threshold was a little rat. He had dullish brown fur and two little eyes perched on the top of his head, and he was completely unclothed. Well, that didn't matter because, as I have said before, they _are_ Muppets. But I wasn't thinking of dress sense at all when he came in, but instead I was doing more of a sort of guilty start. Hey, _whenever_ someone flings open a door unannounced I start feeling guilty of something. And when this rat showed up, boy was I feeling guilty.

"_What_ are you doing in here?" he demanded, eyes wide.

All three of us in the room jumped up at that, and we all answered "Nothing!" at the same time. The rat rolled his eyes as best as he could.

"Not _you_," he explained, pointing to Kermit. Kermit sat down again quickly.

"Me?" Fozzie and I asked simultaneously.

"_Both_ of you," the rat confirmed, and my heart jumped worriedly. "Mr. Frog is no longer allowed to have visitors in his office, considering the _distress_ one of his visitors gave him less than an hour ago. Editor's orders, signed by Mr. Zealand himself."

"We were just leaving," Fozzie explained hastily as we edged around the rat towards the door. Kermit looked crestfallen.

"See you at lunch break?" he called hopefully as we shuffled out backwards.

I was about to answer, but once again the rat cut me off. "_About_ that," he began, and my heart sank once again. He began flipping through a piece of paper in his paws, and looking up stated to Kermit, "Boss says your lunch break's been docked 'cus you ran off. Sorry, bub, but it's—"

"—'Editor's orders, signed by Mr. Zealand himself'," Kermit sighed, and waved at me and Fozzie. "Sorry. After work?"

"Yeah, about _that_ too..." the rat continued, but Fozzie and I left before he announced Kermit's punishment in _that_ area. I didn't want to get caught up in business affairs that weren't mine, and besides we'd _already_ said that we were just leaving.

———

**STATLER**: Well, hopefully we can be "just leaving" too!

**WALDORF**: Yeah..."just leaving" this STORY!

**STATLER**: Wait...we can't get out! We've been written in with all our heckling!

**WALDORF**: Oh no!

**STATLER AND** **WALDORF**: AAAAAAAAH!!

———

Once we'd hitched the elevator down, Fozzie turned to me. "Wow, Kermit's boss is really being harsh, huh?"

"Yeah, a bit _too_ harsh," I replied. My brain was whirring and clicking. If Mr. Zealand _used_ to be happy-go-lucky, and he _used_ to be social, and he _used_ to always be out and around with his "fish"—I didn't really understand _that_ part of Kermit's description—why had he suddenly changed six months ago? What sort of momentous catastrophe...

_Ding!_ We'd reached the ground floor, and it was time for my musings to come to a halt before the elevator doors accidentally closed on me. Striding out, we were about to walk out the door when we saw a little guy trying to get Alice to speak _reasonably_. "Please, Miss Alice," he begged, "I have to see my Uncle Kermit!"

"WHO?" Alice screeched back.

"Hold on a minute, Foz," I muttered to Fozzie, and I led him over to the check-in desk where Robin was haggling with Alice. When I was close enough, I waved cheerfully. "Hiya, Robin!"

Robin turned around again and smiled. "Hello, Miss Phyllis," he recognized. "Is Uncle Kermit in?"

"Yeah, but he's not allowed to have visitors right now," I apologized. "Sorry, kiddo."

Robin's face fell. "Why not?" he asked piteously.

"Oh, 'cus he ran out of the office about a murder suspect," Fozzie commented offhandedly. And before I could berate him for saying that sort of thing in front of Robin, my worst fears were realized when I heard what Alice had to say next.

"A MURDER SUSPECT?"

Because the building was full from top to bottom with newspaper reporters, every Muppet within earshot of Alice—who, let me tell you, had an _excellent_ range of being heard—immediately stopped what they were doing and swarmed around us. "Nice going, 'Oznowicz'!" I shouted over the swelling crowd of storyhawks.

"Murder suspect?" "Do you know of a murder suspect?" The cacophony surrounded us. We had to get out _fast_, or someone would figure out exactly who "Mike Oznowicz" was. I figured out the only route of escape we had, and put it into action.

"I don't know anything about it!" I cried out over the voices. "ALICE is the one who yelled it—ask _her!_"

"HUH?!" Alice shouted back, but the crowd had already started swarming around _her_ instead. Hopefully with Alice's low intellect, she'd be able to keep them going for long enough that we could escape. Taking a deep breath, I plunged into the fray and scooped up Robin, and with him securely in the crook of my arm I pulled him and Fozzie out of the mob and straight out the door. Once out, we made our way down the street and into the secureness of a back alley where we could talk. I'd hoped that in all the excitement Robin had forgotten Fozzie's remark, but—

"What about a murder suspect?"

I shot a needling glare at Foz, who shrunk back guiltily. "I've got a case again, Robin," I explained as well as I could, "and your Uncle Kermit got a little..._overexcited_ about the identity of one of the suspects."

"Oh." Too curious for my tastes at the moment, Robin asked, "Why?"

I didn't have the words to explain it without feeling angry at Miss Piggy all over again, so I left it to Fozzie to, in one of his rare moments of absolute brilliance, change the subject. "So, uh..." he tried, "um, what did you want to tell Kermit?"

Robin squinted up at him. "Who are _you?_"

"Mr. Oznowicz," I explained quickly, glancing at Foz. "My...eh..._client_."

The little frog looked like he was going to say something else, but shrugged it off and forgot about it. "I'd rather have told Uncle Kermit," he admitted.

"We understand," I responded. Feeling kind of bad that I had to explain this to the kid myself, I nonetheless went on with it. "Look, Robin," I explained, "Kermit's having a rough time with his boss right now, so he probably won't get off work for a while now. Maybe you can catch him tomorrow and tell him what you have to. OK?"

Robin looked at me. "I may be a little kid, Miss Phyllis, but you don't have to talk down to me," he stated very simply, then while I was still stunned he walked out of the alley. "Good-bye, Miss Phyllis!" he called. "Goodbye, Mr. Oznowicz!"

It took a while for my brain to re-function, but eventually it did and I rebooted to Fozzie looking at me expectantly once more. "Well, Phyllis?" he inquired. "What do we do now?"

I thought it over for a moment. "Well..." I started, "we shouldn't really follow too many more leads if we can't keep Kermit posted, but I believe that there's somewhere we might want to check in again."

"What's that?"

I grinned bitterly. "_Welcome_ _home_ _to_ _The_ _Happiness_ _Hotel_..."

———

**STATLER**: More singing?! OH NO!!

**WALDORF**: What do you EXPECT with these MUPPETS?

**STATLER**: Hey...aren't WE Muppets TOO?

. . . . .

**WALDORF**: JUST when I thought this day couldn't get any worse...


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter 19**: Accidental Jam

It didn't take long for me and Fozzie to get back to the apartment and retrieve our "Sewer Community" disguises and instruments, but we had a heck of a time getting back to the riverfront and the entrance to the place. It felt kind of like someone was tailing us from a distance, but every time I looked around I didn't see a thing. Fozzie didn't seem to notice it at all, though, but I had learned to expect that from him. So, with this unknown presence on our heels, I led a very circuitous route to the sewer, winding all across the town and usually in the opposite direction from the sewer. Eventually the feeling disappeared after we cut through a large crowd congregating around an electronics store. Before we passed, I glanced at the big attraction and saw on a TV set a yellow-skinned, humanoid Muppet newsreporter with glasses reporting on the continued search for the "accused murderer" Fozzie Bear, complete with a picture of self-same comedian. Though someone had taken liberty with the photo by drawing a mustache, fangs and horns on top of Fozzie's features, we hurried past to avoid being recognized and got to the sewer opening without any more feelings of being followed.

When he recognized us, the bouncer reluctantly waved us in, and we ventured cautiously to the Hotel. Once again, "Pops" was asleep when we pushed open the door, and we had to wake him before anything else. When he sat up, blinking, we started some small talk. "How's it goin' today?" I asked.

The old guy scratched his head. "Well," he started, as if he had to consciously try to remember what had happened when he had been awake, "not too bad. Not so many folks checkin' in, but that's OK."

Looking around discreetly, Fozzie went on with the inquiry. "Anything happen since we left?"

"Not too much," the old guy yawned. Either as a result of his sleeping or resulting _in_ his sleeping, his life seemed rather boring to him. "But if you want to know, ask Pépe over at the nightclub. He knows _all_ of it. It'll probably be his death someday."

An intriguing thought. _Had_ _Sam_ _had_ _some_ _knowledge_ _that_ he'd _been_ _killed_ _for?_ "How does he know?" I requested innocently.

Pops yawned again and shrugged. "You'll find it's hard to keep a secret in the Hotel," he offered. "Someone always knows what someone else has been doin', and word inevitably travels. That's where the prawn usually gets it, 'cus at his job he sees most everyone all the time."

The idea made me shiver a little. Did that mean that, somewhere in this place, somebody knew who me and Fozzie really were and what we were doing? I didn't like to think about it. The old guy went on, not noticing. "Oh yeah, where's that _other_ guy?" he asked. "There were three of you yesterday."

For once I had a pre-prepared answer. "He's holding down the fort," I explained. "We're movin' in little by little so nobody gets suspicious."

"Yeah," Fozzie nodded vigorously. "Definitely. Yeah. We're really going little by little. Uh-huh."

I made a mental note to have Fozzie watch _The_ _Great_ _Mouse_ _Detective_ and force him to learn interrogation and disguise skills from it.

Scratching his head again, Pops jerked upwards like he'd suddenly remembered some-thing. "Oh yeah!" he recalled, pulling a sheet of paper our of his drawer and squinting back up at us. "You said the other day that you wanted the chance to 'jam' with somebody, so I asked around and found someone willin' to 'jam' when you came back!"

My heart sank like I'd just jumped thirty thousand feet out of a moving plane. How could we possibly keep up our impression of being musicians in front of _real_ musicians, especially when Kermit was stuck in his office? But I consoled myself because we were supposedly _unemployed_ musicians, we were _supposed_ to sound bad, and maybe we could even pick up some handy information.

I was just getting myself worked up over it when suddenly The Electric Mayhem appeared from behind the stairs with their instruments, and I felt like I was going to spontaneously combust. The feeling grew even _bigger_ when Pops beckoned cheerfully to the band and, cousin Floyd at their head, they came over towards us from behind the desk. " 'Namless', this is The Electric Mayhem," Pops introduced brightly. "Use the room in the back if you want." With that, Pops yawned and promptly fell asleep again, leaving me and Fozzie to deal with them ourselves.

"Hey, man," Zoot offered wheezily, hoisting his saxophone. "The back room, or what?"

"Um...the room in the back's fine," I replied for Fozzie, who seemed to be frozen in time. I rolled my sleeves back over my skin conscientiously and used the fake deep voice I'd performed to Kermit when I'd pretended to be from The Pizza Twins. All that, and at the same time I hoped that none of them recognized me...that none of them realized how this masked, covered-up "mysterious stranger" was exactly the same height and proportions as Floyd's "cousin" Phyllis Pepper...

"Sergeant Floyd Pepper, bass," Floyd introduced as he led us to the back room, me forcedly propelling Fozzie along. "That's Zoot on sax, Dr. Teeth on the keyboard, Animal on drums and my girl Janice, lead guitar."

"_Wednesday_, man..." Zoot reminded from the back of the entourage, and if I really _hadn't_ been the same person as always I would've wondered what the heck he was talking about.

———

**WALDORF**: Well, WE'RE the same people as always, and WE'RE wondering what the heck YOU'RE talking about!

**STATLER**: Are we?

———

In no time flat we had arrived in the empty "back room", and our instruments were mostly set up when Dr. Teeth demanded a reciprocal of what Floyd had given us. "So, who're you two? And why're _you_ covered up like you's really invisible?"

I glanced at Fozzie, who was still trying to cower out of the way. "For your information, I've got a _fur_ _condition_—'Toast Syndrome'," I informed them. "And our names are..." I thought really hard, and in an amazingly miraculous save that I could _never_ equal in all the rest of time, "J. Cheever Loophole and Emmanuel Ravelli."

"Hi 'J.', hi 'Manny'," Janice lilted, slinging her guitar over her shoulder. "Like, can you get _behind_ it?"

I guessed that that was a rhetorical question, so I didn't answer. Fozzie, however, was still trying to get behind _me_, and I nudged him forward so The Electric Mayhem wouldn't get suspicious. But my hopes were dashed as Animal began once more to stare fixedly at me.

"WO-MAN!" he salivated, and tugging against the chain securing him to his drums he tried to rush at me. "WOMAN!"

My blood ran cold. Did he know that I had been the one hiding in their dressing room? Did he, at this very minute, know who I was? I didn't want to have to find out the hard way...

At these insistent cries from Animal, Floyd blinked a couple of times. "_Seriously?_" he inquired, looking at me directly. "Hey man, you're..._not_ a man?"

I shrugged indifferently, hoping desperately that it wouldn't matter too much.

Floyd whistled amazedly. "_Man_, with that voice and that"—he paused, and though I knew what he meant he didn't say it anyways—"well, I didn't think you _were_ a girl!"

"I try," I granted lamely, then did my best to change the subject. "So, what're we going to play?"

"_I_ know!" Janice perked up. "Why don't we first play something _separately_, and then try something _together?_"

"Yeah!" Dr. Teeth agreed, glancing at Floyd. "That way, we can tell how good everyone is!"

The prospect of _that_ didn't appeal too much to my disguise, but I couldn't do much more than go along with it. Fozzie, after I prompted him, nodded too.

"YEAH! YEAH YEAH!!" Animal roared, banging on his drums so hard I thought he'd break them for sure.

"We'll go first," Floyd suggested, and for once I agreed heartily. Plugging in his bass, he counted off for his fellow bandmembers. "3, 2, 1, and—"

They began immediately with a fast, rousing, repetitive tune accenting mostly the keyboard. It didn't sound like they were going to play "Tenderly" again, but the music was still unmistakably The Electric Mayhem's, and after a short musical introduction Dr. Teeth began to speak-sing.

"_Don't_ _want_ _no_ _lovin',  
__Don't_ _want_ _no_ _kissin',  
__Don't_ _want_ _no_ _gal_ _to_ _call_ _me_ _honey_.  
_Don't_ _want_ _my_ _name_ _in_ _the_ _Hall_ _of_ _Fame—  
__Just_ _want_ _a_ _big_ _fat_ _pile_ _of_ _MONEY!"_

A short bar by the sax, and Dr. Teeth kept going.

"_Give_ _me_ _that_ _almighty_ _dollar,  
__For_ _that_ _lettuce_ _hear_ _me_ _holler,  
__Gimme_ _buckets_ _full_ _of_ _ducats,  
__Let me_ _walk_ _around_ _and_ _waller  
__In_ _mazuma,_ el dinero  
_Wanna_ _be_ _a_ _millionaire-o  
__Give_ _me_ _money_ _money_ _money_ _money_ _money!  
_

_Give me_ _that_ _green_ _ammunition  
__That's_ _the_ _stuff_ _for_ _which_ _I'm_ _wishin'  
__Fill_ _my_ _closets_ _with_ _deposits,  
__I'm_ _a_ _DEMON_ _in_ _addition!  
__Gimme_ _shekels,_ _gimme_ _pesos  
__Wanna_ _see_ _their_ _smilin'_ _face-os,  
__Money_ _money_ _money_ _money_ _money!"_

Running his fingers down the keys, Dr. Teeth kept on.

"_I'm gonna git me a suit  
That's made out of loot  
And whistle, 'The Wearin' of Green'.  
I've got that monetary-itis  
Like to be just like King Midas  
Want that Golden Touch, is what I mean."_

He paused for a short musical interlude before going on again.

"_I'm a greenback collector,  
I'm a paper-bill inspector.  
I'm a savage for that cabbage  
Man, to me it's golden nectar  
Pour that filthy lucre on me  
Spread those lovin' GERMS upon me—  
Money money money money money!"_

The tempo of the song began to slow down, and Dr. Teeth did a very impressive finale, touching down on the piano keys extremely hard, proclaiming,

"_And_ _if_ _they_ _ever_ _plant_ _trees_ _of,  
__E_. _Pluribus_ _Unum,_ _I_ _want_ _to_ _be_ _the_ _guy  
__They_ _send_ _out_ _to_ _GROW_ _THEM!  
__Oh,_ _give_ _me_ _money!! Oh! Money money money money..."_

There was a trail-off before a decisive ending chord, and the song was over. Zoot glanced at me and Fozzie, slowly and cautiously lifting his head up from the mouthpiece of his saxophone. "Your turn," he announced.

I tried not to panic, and I could tell that Fozzie was trying too. However, neither of us really succeeded, so I made an attempt to stall for time. "Um...Janice?" I asked timidly. "Could you tune my guitar? My ears are clogged up—side effect of the medications for the Syndrome."

"_For sure-lly_," Janice accepted, and taking my acoustic tested the strings against her own electric. When she plucked a G on mine, all The Electric Mayhem winced at the sound. But Janice tuned it, and perhaps a little more speedily than I was overjoyed about.

"Well?" Floyd cued, his own guitar resting in his lap.

I looked to Fozzie desperately, in case _he_ knew how to play something.

———

**WALDORF**: Besides a bad joke.

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: Heh heh heh!

———

That song we and Kermit had done at the door when we'd first come here...I couldn't remember it, and even so it had been Kermit and his banjo that had made it sound decent. But we couldn't just _stand_ there, so desperately I invented a tune. _Dun_ _dun_ _dun_ _dun_ _dun,_ _dun_ _dun_ _dun_ _dun_ _dun_ _dun_ _DUN_... As Fozzie timidly joined in on kazoo, I started to sing, making up the lyrics on the fly. I was thinking of how we hadn't eaten, and how we'd last encountered Floyd face-to-face at that little diner, so maybe that was why the opening lines went something like this:

"_Movin'_ _right_ _along_ _in_ _search_ _of_ _good_ _times_ _and_ _good_ _news,  
__With_ _good_ _friends_ _you_ _can't_ _lose—"_

Fozzie, gaining a bit more confidence than I was, cut in ahead of me.

"_This_ _could_ _become_ _a_ _habit!"_

I wouldn't let myself be outdone so, grinning behind my neckerchief, I went on before he could continue.

"_Opportunity_ _knocks_ _once,_ _let's_ _reach_ _out_ _and_ _grab_ _it  
__Together_ _we'll_ _nab_ _it—"_

"_We'll_ _hitchhike,_ _bus,_ _or_ _yellow-cab_ _it!"_

Fozzie had inserted himself into the song ahead of me again, so I felt inclined to politely inquire " '_Cab_ it'?" before we chorused.

"_Movin'_ _right_ _along_._"_

Belting his heart out now, Fozzie soloed on the next line and I took the one after him.

"_Footloose_ _and_ _fancy_ _free!"_

"_Getting_ _there_ _is_ _half_ _the_ _fun,_ _come_ _share_ _it_ _with_ _me_._"_

We chorused again.

"_Movin'_ _right_ _along_._"_

I stepped in this time, and Fozzie dropped out.

"_We'll_ _learn_ _to_ _share_ _the_ _load_..._"_

I turned my attention back to playing the guitar, which I had almost forgotten about while we were singing. Smiling widely and enjoying himself now, Fozzie took the next line instead.

"_We_ _don't_ _need_ _a_ _map_ _to_ _keep_ _this_ _show_ _on_ _the_ _road!"_

During the short pause, Fozzie took the time to crack a joke. "My boss told me to turn left at the fork in the road," he chuckled, "but I couldn't even find the _spoon!_"

Groaning and rolling my eyes at his degree of comedy, I took the next line.

"_Movin'_ _right_ _along,_ _we've_ _found_ _a_ _life_ _on_ _the_ _highway_._"_

Fozzie cut in again.

"_And_ _your_ _way_ _is_ _my_ _way_._"_

I stuck in a joke of my own. "So, trust my _navigation!_" I insisted playfully, and hardly aware anymore of The Electric Mayhem we went on with it.

Fozzie took the next line.

"_California here we come, the 'Pie in the Sky' land."_

I came next, sighing.

"_Palm trees, and warm sand..._"

Fozzie chuckled again, adding a throwaway line.

"_Though sadly WE JUST LEFT RHODE ISLAND!"_

I decided to play along, having the time of my life. "We did _what?_"

"Just forget it!"

"_Movin' right along."_

"Hey L.A. where've you gone?" I asked.

"Send someone to fetch us, we're in Saskatchewan!" Fozzie insisted right back before returning to his kazoo.

"_Movin'_ _right_ _along,"_

we chorused again.

"You take it," I offered,

"_You_ _know_ _best_..._"_

Fozzie chuckled and accepted the offer.

"_Hey,_ _I've_ _never_ _seen_ _the_ _sun—  
__Come_ _UP_ _in_ _the_ _WEST?!"_

We took a short break for the music, "fiddling" around on our respective instruments. I was laughing like crazy, the music was so weird. We wrapped up the song by chorusing together once more.

"_Movin'_ _right_ _along_...  
_Movin'_ _right_ _along_...  
_Movin'_ _right_ _along_...  
_Movin'_ _right_ _along_..._"_

And with a decisive ending chord of our own, we had finished.

The mouth of every member of The Electric Mayhem, even Animal's, was hanging wide open, though whether in happy shock or worried shock I had no idea. If I were them, it'd probably be worried shock.

"Hey, what's up?" Foz inquired, carefree again now that he'd gotten over the worst.

Floyd paused and shook his head. "It's just..." he started, then looked right at me. "You sound like my 'cousin' did, when _she_ used to sing. I haven't heard her do that in _ages_, but still..."

I felt my pulse race. I was kind of touched that Floyd was like that over me, but I was _more_ concerned that he'd figure out who I was. I shouldn't have let myself go like that. "So..." I went on in my fake voice, once more trying to change the subject, "um...we're not very good, but...what song do you guys want to do together?"

Floyd jolted at my deep tones, then looked back at his fellow bandmembers. Janice, Dr. Teeth and Zoot all seemed mostly unaffected, and Animal, well, he was _Animal_. "Well..." Floyd attempted, then suddenly whirled around and asked Dr. Teeth, "Wait a minute, what time is it?"

"Uhh..." Dr. Teeth began, then Fozzie cut in on him.

"About eleven-ten."

"Oh no!" Janice cried once she'd heard the reading on Fozzie's amazing internal time-piece. "Drag _city!_ Oh, a few more minutes and we'd've—!"

"Aw, man, you're _right_," Zoot groaned, self-consciously closing his fingers over the holes of his sax.

"Go bye-bye?" Animal asked almost piteously—well, he'd have been _almos_t piteous if he hadn't been chewing on the canvas of his drums as he said it.

Floyd sighed as he and the rest of The Electric Mayhem started packing up their instruments again. "Sorry, 'J.', 'Manny'," he apologized, "but we can't stay. We've got another engagement that needs our _undivided_ attention."

"What, already?" Fozzie pleaded. "We haven't even gotten to 'jam' together!"

"Look, I'm really sorry," Floyd elaborated, apologectic but forceful, "but we really _gotta_ go." As he said that, he and his bandmembers started filing out the door. I started to wave haphazardly, but Floyd turned back to me. "Oh yeah," he said, "have you ever _met_ my cousin? Phyllis Pepper?"

"I might've," I responded automatically, and I almost forgot to use my false voice before the words tumbled out. Shaking his head in thought, Floyd took up the rear of the procession moving out.

"Wow," Fozzie breathed once they were gone. "Floyd really _can_ be a nice guy."

"Yeah," I replied, lost in thought, then snapped out of it as I realized something. "_Except when he's consciously around me!_"

* * *

We spent the rest of the day in the sewer place, pretty much because a) we had nowhere else to go, and b) I wanted to find out where The Electric Mayhem had gone, and when they were coming back. The latter wants we in no way acquired, because after we approached Pépe as Pops had suggested, he refused to tell us anything without getting paid. And though Fozzie didn't have a whoopee cushion on him this time, he _did_ manage to find a telephone-shaped candy dispenser—which Pépe then accepted and started _talking_ on it. After waiting for him to "hang up", we finally got to ask him where The Electric Mayhem had gone, but once more he refused to say anything. We didn't ask too many other people in case suspicion arose, and we declined to search the room this time considering what had happened yesterday. So we just hung out, tried to practice our instruments as well as we could, and had lunch. Around six-thirty, the time Kermit's job was usually over, we excused ourselves from the premises—which The Electric Mayhem had still failed to reappear at—and went back to the flat. Kermit hadn't come back yet, so we waited for him.

Kermit didn't return home until around nine P.M.

"Mr. Zealand," he tiredly explained, "or, the _rats_ informed me _instead_ _of_ Mr. Zealand that I had to work even _more_ unpaid overtime because of my 'little stunt'." Groaning with weariness, Kermit counted on his fingers. "I wrote two home fashion articles, three culture newsletters, eighteen fillers and an advice column. And how much do you think I'm getting _paid_ for it?"

He told us, and I fell out of my chair in astonishment. "He can't get _away_ with that!" I protested. "Sue him! Report him to City Hall!"

"Hit him with a rubber chicken!" Fozzie stuck in indignantly.

"Do _something!_" I concurred with a bit of violent resentment towards the _Times_'s editor.

"I can't," Kermit objected achingly. "With the sort of money _we_ make, we'd have to get someone like _Marvo the Magician_ to actually be able to hold up in court. And I can't report my editor to City Hall because Mr. Zealand is a _lot_ more respected than I am. _I'd_ end up having to pay _him_ for _libel!_"

"Like _The_ _Libeled_ _Lady_," I commented suddenly, then when Kermit gave me an impatient look I apologized, "Sorry."

"And _hit him with a rubber chicken?_" Kermit demanded of Fozzie.

"Why not?" Foz queried innocently. "Too subtle?"

Kermit sighed in exasperation and tiredness. "Look, I don't know about you two," he announced, standing up, "but I'd like to get some sleep."

"Good idea," Fozzie yawned. He was back in his normal clothes again, just the spotted necktie and hat with no sunglasses or Groucho glasses or anything. At another time I would've argued against his doing this, as someone could pop in on short notice, but as it was nighttime, well, we were just going to go to sleep anyways.

Kermit trailed off to his room with a backwards call of "Good night", and Fozzie stumbled into my room again for _his_ shut-eye. I myself, like I had for the past two nights, grabbed a blanket and curled up on the sofa in the living room. It was a lot more comfortable than my bed had been to me, I realized in surprise. _Well,_ _maybe_ _since_ _I_ _now_ _have_ _this_ _permanent_ _crick_ _in_ _my_ _neck_...

A heavy banging on the door woke me up immediately. How long had it been? The existence of pitch-black darkness from beyond the flimsy drapes told me that it wasn't morning. Well then, who could it have been? I got my answer in a way that sent my insides into a jumbled panic.

"PEPPER? Open up, this is the police!"

———

**WALDORF**: Why do chapters always have to end like this?

**STATLER**: Like what?

**WALDORF**: The cliffhanger. You know, the "what'll happen to our poor heroes" type of thing.

**STATLER**: What're you TALKING about? Look at this page, you old fool!

. . . . . . . . . .

**WALDORF**: Hey, the chapter DOESN'T end with a cliffhanger! It ends with us heckling it!

**STATLER**: I love to change the course of history.

**WALDORF**: Yeah, especially since you've seen so MUCH of it in your time!

WHUMPH.

**STATLER**: You have TOO. You're just as old as I am!

**WALDORF**: Really? I didn't KNOW you were twenty-one!

**STATLER**: ...

———

_A/N: The song "Money", featured in this chapter, was written by Stan Freberg and Ruby Raskin and initially appeared in _The Muppet Show_. The lyrics were obtained from _The Muppet Show_ Season 1 DVDs, disc 1._

_The song "Movin' Right Along", also featured in this chapter, was written by Paul Williams and Kenny Ascher and initially appeared in _The Muppet Movie. _The lyrics were obtained from _It's Not Easy Bein' Green—The Muppets Sing-Along _video._


	20. Chapter 20

**Chapter 20**: An Unwelcome Surprise

I leapt up immediately to keep Fozzie from leaving my room, so the Chief made his _own_ way in by smashing the wood and plaster with his police-issue club. His entrance was rather dramatic as he stood silhouetted in the doorway with three subordinate policemen—Officer Beauregard, Officer Baskerville and Officer Crazy Harry—standing in front of him. However, I didn't really think that Uncle Deadly in all his landlordly-ness would appreciate that they had successfully shrunk our door a good foot and a half all the way around. As would be a natural reaction for anyone who has just had their apartment covered in rubble, Kermit ran out of his room immediately. "What's going on?" he demanded, still in his pajamas.

"Police business," Chief Sweetums grunted somewhat triumphantly, and as I came back into the main room he brandished his club at me. "Pepper," he announced in a hard, smug voice, "I checked the records. There is no 'Oznowicz' listed as living in this town!"

I was stunned. How could that be, if Shoeshine Scooter was able to give me information about some guy named _Mike_ Oznowicz? The Chief was probably trying to psyche me out. "There isn't?" I countered—a really stupid retort, I know, but still. "You tried the _main_ branch of the offices?"

"Every branch from here to the human cities," the Chief retorted boastfully.

"Um...Yeah!" Beauregard agreed. "From here to the...human cities!" He looked up. "How do you get _there?_"

"Oh, go blow yourself up or something," Chief Sweetums shot back. Two seconds later both he and I wished he hadn't said it, because Officer Crazy Harry—a little guy with long arms, protrudant eyes and a wild black beard—pulled out a dynamite plunger from somewhere on his person.

"Hee hee hee!" he cackled in a very high-pitched voice. "Did you say _blow_ _up?_" And pushing down on the plunger, our apartment suffered a miniature explosion in the vicinity of the police officers.

_Please_ _let_ _the_ _explosion_ _have_ _jumbled_ _their_ _memories_, I tried praying, though I am somewhat of an atheist. Alas, that last fact was all too clear, because once the smoke and debris cleared out, Chief Sweetums staggered back upright and demanded, "All right, where is this so-called 'Mr. Oznowicz'?"

———

**WALDORF**: Oh, she's an atheist?

**STATLER**: She said that before. I'M an Alzheimers agnostic!

**WALDORF**: A WHAT?

**STATLER**: An Alzheimers agnostic...I can't remember whether I don't believe in anything or not!

———

"We have no idea where he is," Kermit replied calmly, but if you inspected him close enough he was shaking like a leaf. "So please, just pay for the damage and—and—blow off!"

Apparently everyone was using the wrong terminology today, because Crazy Harry pulled out his plunger again and inquired enthusiastically, "Did somebody say _blow_ _off?_" before he pushed down on the plunger again and the floor _re_-blew up.

Officer Baskerville yelped and dove for cover under the sofa just in case Crazy Harry was set off again. But once again it was the Chief who was set off as he lurched once more to his feet and pointed with a singed and smoking finger at Kermit. "What's _he_ doing in your apartment?"

"We're roommates," I asserted testily, slowly moving to try and shield Kermit. "Both of us live here in a very _respectable_ manner. And besides that, it is none of your _business_."

"_Everything's_ my business, Pepper," the Chief growled, bending in closer towards me. "_I_ am the _law_." Suddenly he straightened up and started waving a hand over his nose, coughing and retching. "And _I_ am asking—what is that _awful_ smell?"

Thankfully I had been too lazy to have changed out of my still-reeking trenchcoat before going to bed, so I stepped forward in an attempt to subdue him through his olfactory system. Unfortunately, though, he got used to the smell after about fifteen seconds, so he went on with his statement. "Because _I_ am the _law_," he repeated, "_everything's_ my business."

"Well then, if you're the law, get your 'lawishness' all done with and let _us_ get some _sleep!_" I insisted, crossing my arms. It didn't take too much acting on my part to get my indignance across to him.

"Only after you tell me where 'Oznowicz' is," he answered dangerously, "or should I say...Fozzie Bear?"

The tense, oppressive silence was broken by Officer Beauregard, who scratched his head. "Hey, Chief," he asked slowly, just realizing it, "isn't that 'Fozzie Bear' the same guy we were looking for today?"

Chief Sweetums rolled his eyes. "Of _course_, you blockhead!" he shouted. "He's a _murder_ _suspect!_ How do I have to make you realize that, _bang_ it into your head?"

"Hee hee hee! Did somebody say _bang?_"

"NO!" we all shouted, but Crazy Harry pushed the plunger _again_, and this time some of the floorboards actually caught _fire_. Baskerville had to scamper back out from under the sofa before one of them caught him on his tan, fuzzy tail, so he just huddled in the corner, quivering. _My_ concern, however—_besides_ keeping Fozzie's existence in this apartment a secret—was who was going to pay for all the refurbishing that was going to have to take place.

"I don't know where he is!" I insisted. "And I _don't_ believe that Mr. Oznowicz was Fozzie Bear!"

"Oh _yeah?_" the Chief retorted, getting his wind back. Once more he made a violent gesture in my general direction as he argued. "You said that _he_ was the one who paid you for the Eagle's murder case. So you _must_ have known, unless your stupidity exceeds even the rest of your race."

"Whether Mr. Oznowicz was Fozzie Bear or not is his business," I responded, trying to be as calm as I possibly could. If I didn't keep a level head, I'd get caught in the Chief's trap and everything would be over. "All I know is that he was paying me to investigate, and the money he gave up front seemed genuine enough. And I insist, I have _no_ idea of his whereabouts."

The Chief sauntered casually over to me, but not too far beneath the relaxed air he was giving off was seething anger, as well as more pride in the success that he was sure he had already ascertained. "Oh, I don't think so," he rumbled, coming even closer. "In fact," he went on, "I think he may even be in _this_ _very_ _apartment!_"

The words stunned me speechless, so it was with great relief that I allowed Kermit to talk instead of me. "Even if Mr. Oznowicz _was_ Fozzie Bear," Kermit ventured quite a bit more logically than I could've managed at that moment, "and even if he _wasn't_, why would he be in this apartment? In the first scenario, he would be a murder suspect, and in the second, well, we wouldn't know him well enough to invite him into our home!"

The Chief started pacing around the room, swinging his club menacingly. "Oh, I don't know about that," he offered, then in a swift movement ripped the blanket off the couch and inspected underneath it. "You see," he went on, continuing his pacing before jumping behind our TV set as if he thought someone would be hiding behind it, "if _you_"—he pointed his club at Kermit, who shrank back—"live with Pepper, and you usually accompany her, then this 'Oznowicz', who I've seen with her even _more_, must live here TOO!"

"He's my client!" I sputtered, clenching my fists. "He wanted to be in with the action, that's why he followed me on my investigations!"

The Chief ignored me, and kept going on his rounds around the flat. Eventually he made it to the kitchen, where Kermit and I, along with the other cops, followed him. Just as we entered the room, the Chief smashed his club through the door of our closet. He withdrew it, and it suddenly had a vintage bowler on the end that I recognized with dread. "Aha!" he grinned triumphantly, holding it up for us to see. "The hat of Mr. Oznowicz!"

"There are _tons_ of hats like those!" Kermit protested. "He could've gotten _his_ from _anywhere!_"

"And _his_," the Chief concluded, waving the hat, "came from _this_ _apartment_." Smiling again, the two fangs on his lower lip protruded. "I'm going to blow this case _wide_ _open_."

Even as he spoke he suddenly realized what he'd just said, as he dove for cover mere _seconds_ before Crazy Harry cried, "Did somebody say _blow_ _wide_ _open?_" and once more pushed down the plunger. I just covered my head and thought how funny Fozzie would probably find all this if he wasn't hidden away in my bedroom at that moment.

"Wow," Beauregard commented woozily, sitting up from the singed spot on the tiles where he'd just been blown, "this is happening a lot today, isn't it?"

Undaunted, the Chief went right on with his own destroying of the flat as he searched high and low for Foz, all the while shooting accusations over his shoulder at us. The brute strength wielding his club wasn't the only fearful consideration whirling around my mind as he commented, "I've got it all figured out, Pepper: the bear was known to have set a private investigator on his boss—unless I'm mistaken, that was _you_. And I'm _never_ mistaken."

"Except for thinking that we're _involved_ in all this!" Kermit protested as the Chief investigated closer and closer to the hall, directly beyond which was a door wherein contained a probably very scared but very innocent hiding bear. I tried to block it with my foul odor, but Chief Sweetums apparently had obtained very tolerant nasal passages.

"If you weren't _involved_ in it, you wouldn't be defying me!" the Chief barked back, side-swiping Kermit out of his way before barging into the hall. Knocking some very nice holes into the walls as he passed, he swung his head from side to side, looking for some sort of clue. "AHA!" he cried again and, jumping up in glee, his club took out a chunk of the ceiling, which didn't have luck enough to have fallen on his head.

"Um, sorry about the destruction," Beauregard whispered to me and Kermit from behind, casting his eyes down when we turned to him. "It's just, um, the Chief is a little, uh, _excited_." Tripping over himself in answering, he hurriedly said, "I'll clean it up, you see, I'm the force janitor, and, well, I'm only here 'cus they ran out of people, and—"

"Shut your yapping!" Chief Sweetums ordered, and Beauregard fell silent instantly. Swinging his club at a patch of floor immediately outside the door of my room (and decimating another wall in the process), he exclaimed, "I've found where the bear is!"

For a second I was sure that I could hear Fozzie shivering from the next room, but then I realized that it was just my knees knocking. "Fozzie Bear," the Chief imparted triumphantly to us, "is in _that_ _room!_" And to the sound of the growing beats of my frantic heart, he brandished his club at the door to my room and missed smashing it in by the width of a hair. That seemed intentional; he would let us sweat it out before he knocked the door off its hinges and revealed what he, Kermit and myself knew what lay beyond.

"And how do you know that, boss?" Crazy Harry asked hyperactively. This act had probably been rehearsed back at the police station, because these were the first words I'd heard him say that didn't involve asking confirmation that somebody just said something related to explosions.

———

**WALDORF**: Isn't that a run-on sentence?

**STATLER**: No...THIS is a run-on sentence: RUN!!

**WALDORF**: Oh.

. . . .

**STATLER**: Never mind, we STILL can't run anywhere with these chains.

———

"I know," the Chief informed us all smugly, "because of _this!_" And to my private horror, he lifted from the floor a white-and-pink spotted scrap of Fozzie's necktie that must have gotten caught in the doorframe when he'd gone to bed. I tried to remain indifferent as I thought up a comment on the fly.

"How did _that_ get there?" I inquired, faking surprise. I took the scrap from the Chief and, holding it up, turned to Kermit. "Kermit, did your..._undershorts_...get caught on the way to your room with the laundry?" As ridiculous as this accusation was, it was even more unconvincing since we didn't have a washing machine in the flat. Just the laundromat down the street, with the detergent lady who, according to Scooter's information, was the girlfriend of the leader of a biker gang.

"It might've," Kermit admitted with a bit of eye-averting, catching onto my story. Looking pointedly at the Chief, he said, "That could be the pattern of one of my _undergarments _...want me to bring them out to make sure?"

"NO!!" the Chief cried back in horror, recoiling. _YES!_ I thought. _We've_ _got_ _him!_ _He_ _can_ _leave!_ Unfortunately, my celebration was short-lived, as the next sentence out of the Chief's mouth was, "I don't _need_ to, because I know on evidence that this belongs to one Fozzie Bear!"

I tried to bar the door inconspicuously, but Chief Sweetums caught on to my arm and hurled me aside. "No..." I croaked. My head swam. Maybe it was the continuing rotten smell of my trenchcoat, but I felt like I was going to pass out. They _couldn't_ find Fozzie. They _couldn't_. Not 'till I'd found the _real_ murderer...but if it turned out to actually be Fozzie—I thought hard about it while the Chief pulled back his club as if in slow motion, and realized that even if Fozzie _had_ been the killer, I would probably still have hidden him. I'd grown kind of...well, you might say I'd become _attached_ to that funny little guy. But if the Chief caught him now, as his club began to make the pathway towards the forbidden door—

"Just _what_," demanded a softly menacing voice, "is going on here?"

———

**STATLER**: A really boring story, that's what!

———

The Chief was so utterly shocked by the sudden inclusion of a new character in the conversation that his club veered off-course and struck through another wall instead. Swearing, Chief Sweetums withdrew his weapon from the rabble and turned around just as Kermit and I, as well as the Chief's subordinate officers, saw the smallish, draconic figure silhouetted in the kitchen doorway and wearing a pinstriped nightshirt and nightcap.

"It's a PHANTOM!" Officer Beauregard called out fearfully.

"It's a DRAGON!" Baskerville yelped, darting behind the Chief's immense frame.

"It's _both_," I answered, relief seeping into my tones as I recognized him. "It's Uncle Deadly, our landlord!"

"Indeed," Uncle Deadly confirmed, picking his way across the fallen chunks of ceiling and floor while also not dropping the lit candle in his hands. Blinking not so much sleepily as alertly, he stared up at the Chief, who cowered back as though Uncle Deadly was the plague. Well, I wouldn't be surprised if our landlord had actually _spread_ that disease in some long-ago time, he seemed like enough to have possibly been alive then...

"And how is it," the dragon asked coldly of Chief Sweetums, "that several enforcers of the law are destroying _my_ apartment building?"

"Well, I, uh," the Chief stumbled in fear, then spotting me and Kermit with his roving eyes he pointed at us and cried, "THEY'RE HARBORING A MURDERER!"

"I don't _care_," Uncle Deadly replied candidly, his long tail swishing across the floor. "_They're_ not destroying my apartment building, and neither is this 'murderer'."

"I—" Chief Sweetums started in confusion, waving his arm and club around and inadvertently knocking out some more of the apartment, "but—but it's a _murderer!_"

"Please depart from _my_ tenants' rooms," the landlord ordered very calmly, yet at the same time very sinisterly. Pointing with a draconic hand at the door out, he insisted, "City Hall shall hear of this."

Baskerville and Beauregard started shuffling quietly towards the door, but both the Chief and Crazy Harry stayed put—the Chief because he was fighting a war, and Crazy Harry presumably because he had nothing better to do. "Oh _yeah_?" the Chief retorted, gathering himself up so that he towered over Uncle Deadly even more. "And City Hall shall hear of _this_ too, because of your _obstructing_ a _police_ _operation!_"

Sighing theatrically, Uncle Deadly stated calmly, "You'll regret this," before uttering one simple word: "Explode."

Right on cue, Crazy Harry started laughing like a maniac, inquiring pointlessly, "Did somebody say _explode?_" and pushed down the plunger. The Chief erupted into more black smoke and, cooking quite nicely, staggered towards the door.

"You've gotten me this time, Mr. Deadly," the Chief called back, balling up a fist, "but I'll be back! As long as those two are harboring a murderer, _I'll_ _be_ _back!!_"

With that, he stumbled out the door with his three followers trailing in his wake. As soon as they were gone, Uncle Deadly snorted after them and, turning to me and Kermit, asked, "Are you perhaps _really_ harboring a murderer?"

"No, _sir!_" the two of us protested in chorus, shaking our heads vigorously.

"Oh, too bad," he sighed ruefully, making the candle flicker, "it might have been nice to meet one. Oh well."

"We're really sorry about all this, Mr. Deadly," Kermit piped up in a small voice. "We promise, as soon as we can we'll pay for the repairs, and we'll get the rent in too, we—"

"Ah, _hang_ the rent!" Uncle Deadly cried out, startling me. _This_ didn't sound like our landlord. "Listen," he confided, "I'll obtain the money from City Hall. I know the _best_ lawyer in town—_me_." Going on at a fearful rate, he continued, "Since _this_ flat is pretty much demolished, you can move upstairs until the repairs are done. I'll even help you load and unload your details! Just wait until tomorrow, and you'll be in another suite entirely. And I'll give you as long an extension on the rent as you need."

Taken utterly aback, all I could manage to choke out was, "Th-_Thank_ you, Uncle Deadly!" Grasping his hand, I shook it so hard my nerves felt jittery. "Thank you very much!"

"Don't mention it," he blew off, and turned to leave. Thinking twice, though, he turned back and commented, "Miss Pepper, I must say that is _lovely_ perfume you're wearing. _Rotting Corpse_ is one of my _favorite_ scents."

Before I could even make a remark of any kind, he had shut the door and was gone.

"_Rotting Corpse_?" Fozzie asked, clambering out of my room through the hole in the wall. "Did he say _Rotting Corpse_?"

I grinned and took off my trenchcoat, waving it around. "Boys," I announced as we clutched our noses in unison, "I don't think this coat is heading to the cleaners' for a _long_ time."


	21. Chapter 21

**Chapter 21**: Lew Zealand

We all had a bit of a fitful night's rest that night, as Fozzie doubled up in Kermit's room for safety. I, being unable to sleep on the couch because of the mass destruction in the living room, went back to my own room for my forty winks. Any way it went, though, we were at least all adequately rested when we got up the next morning for a healthy dose of fresh oatmeal, courtesy of Uncle Deadly.

"That smell must _really_ drive him wild!" I commented while savoring the taste of _real_ food for breakfast.

"Well, it's not exactly driving _us_ wild, Phyllis," Kermit commented while covering wherever on his froggy anatomy his nose might be. "And no matter _how_ much the landlord likes it, I think we should burn it or at least destroy it at sea."

———

**STATLER**: Like this story.

**WALDORF**: Like your remains.

**STATLER**: I thought I said that when I died, I wanted to be buried in a cemetary!

**WALDORF**: Not THOSE remains! When you keep saying that we have to "REMAIN" here!

**STATLER**: Oh. AHAHA...ha...I don't get it...

**WALDORF**: Never mind, it makes no sense anyways.

———

I at least locked the offending trenchcoat in the bottom drawer of my dresser and wore a cleaner, if slightly smaller, one before we set out for _The Muppetburg Times_. This time, Robin was waiting inside the lobby when we walked in, and ran over to Kermit the second he set flippered foot in the room.

"Uncle Kermit! Uncle Kermit!" he called, and Kermit put down his briefcase just long enough to give the kid a one-armed hug.

"Hi ho, Robin!" he greeted the enthusiastic little frog, whirling him around for a bit before setting him back on the ground. "I can't have visitors while I'm in the office anymore," Kermit explained regretfully, "but I'll see you again during lunch break if you want."

Kermit started towards the elevator while Fozzie and I started for the door out, but Robin stopped his uncle. "But Uncle Kermit," he protested, "I have something important to say!"

Kermit glanced at the clock, then sighed at the time. "If I'm late I'll hear it from my editor again," he lamented, but he kneeled down to Robin anyways. "But that's OK. Tell me what's on your mind, Robin."

Robin clambered onto Kermit's knee. "But it's _just _your editor that I'm worried about!" he announced, and I stuck around to listen. Lowering his voice a little, Robin whispered, "Uncle Kermit, I—well, I know I'm not supposed to go in the offices around here or anything, but the other day, I, well, I couldn't _help_ myself."

"What did you do?" Kermit asked, not reprimanding or anything though with a touch of concern in his voice.

Robin turned his head down a little guiltily. "Well, I always wondered what a _real_ editor was like," he admitted, "so I went up to Mr. Zealand's office and thought I'd talk to him for a while, if he'd let me. But his secretary was on lunch break, and I didn't think it'd be such a good idea to try to use the intercom by myself. So I, well," he lowered his voice even more, "I peeked through the keyhole in the door."

"Really?" Fozzie asked, more into the conversation than any of us. He was wearing the "Emmanuel Ravelli" disguise instead of the "Oznowicz" one, just to be safe in case the Chief _was_ still watching. "_I_ always wondered what an editor was like too," he rambled. "I mean, I have a writer, Gags Beas—"

The two kin frogs didn't even seem to notice him, and Robin just went on. "I—I didn't see Mr. Zealand anywhere," he whispered, maybe even a little scaredly, "just—just a bunch of _rats!_"

Kermit was taken aback for a moment, then laughed. "Robin, that's nothing to be _afraid_ of!" he chuckled. "Mr. Zealand was probably out for a fish break or something and just left his rats in the office while he was gone."

"But—" Robin protested, "but Uncle Kermit—"

"You have some pretty wild ideas in your head there, Robin," Kermit acknowledged, then his tone grew a little more stern. "But don't go spying like that again. It's not a good habit to pick up."

"This from the frog who rooms with a private investigator," I muttered just loud enough for Kermit to hear, smiling behind my hand. He gave me a bit of a sour look, then picked Robin up and set him on the floor again before standing up.

"I've got to run," Kermit called as he raced for the elevator. "Goodbye, all!"

"See ya at lunch!" I called back.

"Lunchtime, froggy!" came Fozzie.

I was just about to leave when Robin tugged on the hem of my trenchcoat. I looked down at him, then with a mighty exhale of breath I bent myself enough to squat on the floor facing him. "Yes, Robin?"

Robin was looking worried, and as Fozzie knelt down beside me the little frog started fidgeting. "I don't want to bother you, Miss Phyllis," he apologized, "it's just, Uncle Kermit ran off before I could tell him the _important_ part."

"It's no bother," I responded, though I was thinking the opposite. If I was going to avoid another scene like that one with the Chief last night, I was going to have to wrap up this murder _today_. "What is it?"

Glancing around, Robin lowered his voice again. "Well, it's just...I know I was breaking another rule, but I—I went over to Doc Hopper's Frog Legs. And I met someone there."

"Was it Doc Hopper?" I cried out, then lowered my voice again as Alice peered interestedly over the top of her desk. When Robin shook his head, I went on. "Did he try to steal your legs for one of his 'bucket' specials? Oh, Robin, you _know_ you're not supposed to go over there, even _with _an adult—"

"I _know_ that," Robin broke in with a bit more patience than I would have managed, though his voice was still a little panicky. "I was just walking that way, and I just went over to check it out, and this person—well, I can't exactly describe him without taking you there."

I hesitated. I'd be breaking one of Kermit's golden rules, which was to never take Robin anywhere within even a fifteen-mile radius of Doc Hopper's. But Robin was so insistent...but I had to solve Sam's murder...but...

———

**WALDORF**: Yeah, ABOUT that murder. When's she going to get around to actually SOLVING it?

**STATLER**: SHH! Not so loud, she'll HEAR you! You actually WANT this story to keep going?!

———

A voice rang out in my head, one not from the present but a voice from the day before. Robin's voice, saying, "_I may be a little kid, Miss Phyllis, but you don't have to talk down to me_." I sighed and slipped Robin's little hand into mine. "Fo—" I started, but then instead of using a name, just glanced back at the bear. "Stay at Movin' Right Along for now, and lay low. We'll be back soon."

* * *

Doc Hopper's was a big, imposing place with two huge, flippered plastic frog legs sticking up out of the ground in front of it. It was located in the part of Muppetburg closest to the human cities, which was no real surprise considering that the chain of restaurants was owned _by_ a human. The franchise, as I understand, was popular enough in the human world that they got up enough money to try branching out into Muppetburg. But all the frogs in the town had, understandably, stayed far away from the spot ever since it had opened last year—though this unspoken law was being slowly broken as Robin led me to the whitewashed takeout building, clutching my hand tightly.

Inching forward across the vacant lot spread out in either direction from the building itself, we eventually made our way up to the outdoor tables without remarkable incident. Surprisingly, there _were _a few Muppets seated around, munching on—thankfully—_hamburgers_ as opposed to the famous Doc Hopper Crunchy Frog Leg Buckets. However, I noticed with some worry that posted on the side of the pay phone were all the numbers possible for poison control.

Beckoning me over to a specific takeout window, Robin carefully sidled up to it and poked his head up over the sill. With a small intake of breath, the little frog cried to me, "Duck!" before hunching down himself. I began to wonder exactly what in a joint like _this_ could make me want to duck unless it was another frog trying desperately to escape, but my instincts have proved to me that in times of doubt, get out of the way.

And Robin's advice wasn't wrong, because a mere second after I stooped down something whizzed past at the exact spot where my head had just been. Looking up in alarm, I saw that it was a _fish_. Even _more_ shocking, once I'd gotten over _that_ part, was that the fish hovered directly in midair for a moment before spinning back towards the takeout window and landing smartly in the outstretched hand of—

I had to look again before my eyes took in the picture. Leaning out of the takeout window, a Doc Hoppers hat perched on his head, was a little clownlike Muppet, complete with round red nose and ruffled, white-and-red clown suit beneath the Doc Hoppers employee pinstriped apron. He had two wide eyes, a fuzz of black hair on top of his head and an even more wild crop of it beneath his nose. And he was laughing his head off, clutching his crazy fish and throwing it out again, where it once more whipped around in the air and returned. As he grasped his fish once more, wearing a sillier grin than even _Fozzie's_ on his face, he finally noticed me and Robin. "Boomerang fish!" he called cheerfully, waving to us with his fish. "I throw the fish in the air...they sail away...and then they come back to me!"

Straightening very cautiously in case he decided to give his fish another whirl, the clown guy suddenly turned around, and just moments later a voice called, "Zealand! Quit bothering the customers, they don't _care_ about your boomerang fish!"

_Zealand?_ This sounded like something I should probably look into. "Oh, but really, we are," I insisted, still keeping hold on Robin's hand.

You should have seen the change come over the guy. His eyes widened further, and his mouth opened in wordless ecstasy. It was kind of like when I'd asked Dr. Honeydew for those printouts of Muppet Labs stuff, or when I'd complimented Fozzie on his comedic techniques...actually, most Muppets were like that, now that I think of it. "_REALLY?_" he shouted, and immediately he had torn off his Doc Hopper cap and apron and bodily clambered out of the takeout window, touching down very neatly on the ground. "_Well_ then," the guy said, gesturing at a table, "sit _down!_"

I glanced at Robin. "Th-thank you..." I managed, and we sat down after him.

A light purple Whatnot poked his head out of the takeout window. "_Zea_-land!" he protested, but as this "Zealand" propped his feet up on the table and started unfolding a copy of _The Muppetburg Times_ the other guy just shook his head irritably. He'd probably realized that retrieving him to his post would be near impossible.

While our host flipped through the newspaper, I leaned back and whispered behind my hand to Robin, "_This_ guy?"

With the little kid's vigorous nod, I turned back to face "Zealand", who was still looking at the paper. Suddenly, though, he put it down in disgust. "You know," he commented, his voice as rotund and bouncy as a stress ball, "this paper isn't even good enough to wrap fish in anymore."

An odd expression, but it got his point across. I thought hard and after deliberating over the words, I asked, "Excuse me, I don't think I learned your name, Mr...?"

"Oh!" he realized, and stuck his fish across the table for me to shake. "I," he announced in that incredibly amusing voice, "am Lew Zealand, and _this_"—he indicated the fish—"is one of my amazing boomerang fish!" Lew patted it proudly, and elaborated, "Number Three. Say hi to the fish!"

"Um...hi," Robin stated, obviously a bit worried by the fact that not only was he being told to talk to a _dead_ fish, he actually _was_ talking to the dead fish. "I'm Robin."

"I'm Phyllis," I introduced, and with a sidelong glance at the takeout window I asked, "Could you excuse me? I'd like to use the phone."

"Ah yes, the phone," Lew began, wandering into a personal story of some sort. Robin tried to stand up and follow me as I left for the pay phone, but as Mr. Zealand began talking Robin apparently found himself unable to get up while still being polite. "One time, I was with my boomerang fish, and—"

I was soon out of hearing range for the story, although Lew's voice certainly carried well enough with the volume he put on it. Though I first had to wait for some guy to call the health center because of something in his food, eventually I made it to the phone. It was a different model than I was used to—probably due to the human influence—so to avoid the possibility of electrocution I had to dig up some change from the scanty tips people had left on their tables. At length, though, I got enough coins together to pay for the call and, in a brilliant move that I somehow had never managed to consider before, dialed Kermit's number directly instead of trying to haggle with Alice.

"Kermit the Frog, _The Muppetburg Times_, make it short because I don't have much phone time today," the amphibian's tired voice recited.

"Kermit," I began immediately without any prelude. "Is your boss in?"

"Phyllis?" he asked confusedly before answering my question. "Well, you'd have to call on a different extension to get him—"

"I'm not trying to call him, just is he in his office right now?" I demanded.

Even more bewildered, Kermit replied anyways. "Well, I _think_ so," he said.

"I need a definite!"

I heard some shuffling as Kermit apparently poked his head out the door and looked around the corner at his boss's office. "Yeah, he's in there," Kermit confirmed, "but what—"

I cut him off, casting a glance at Lew Zealand still talking Robin's ear off. "Listen," I instructed, "six months ago before Mr. Zealand stopped being seen at the office, did he have a round face, a red clown nose, a black mustache and did he go around with boomerang fish?"

"Yes," he responded dazedly, "How di—"

I didn't hear the rest of what he was trying to say because I hung up the phone with a c_lick_. That was all I needed. Stalking my way back to our table past the choking and/or food poisoned Muppets, I sat down just as Lew finished his lecture. "—and _that's_ how me and my boomerang fish saved a worried guy who was _almost_ married!"

———

**WALDORF**: REALLY?

**STATLER**: Yeah, really. I was a WITNESS!

**WALDORF**: REALLY?

**STATLER**: Well of COURSE, what do you—

**WALDORF**: REALLY?

**STATLER**: Hey wait, you're cheating again, aren't you? TURN THAT HEARING AID ON!

———

"Well, um, Mr. Zealand," I interrupted as he took a breath in preparation for the _rest_ of his life story, "uh...where did you used to work before now?"

"Huh?" he asked, then scratched his head with his fish. "Um, a newspaper, I think..."

"Was it _The Muppetburg Times_?" I prompted. Robin just looked up at me, not surprised or anything, just watching. He'd known that Lew had been the editor all the time—that much was clear.

Using the fish to tap his head, Lew remarked, "Yeah, I think it _was_." Picking up the _Times_ again, he unrolled it and spread it on the table. Now using his fish as a _pointer_, he declared, "And, you know, _every day_ I read this newspaper, and _every day_ there's a bunch of letters to the editor in it, and all of them say 'To Mr. Zealand'. And even though I've been gone for a long time, every day _I_ answer!" He settled back in his chair with the paper again, giggling. "I always like to see what I'm going to say to the next one. Sometimes my answers in here are so funny!"

This clenched it, and that particular case was solved. The answer was so simple, I couldn't believe that I hadn't thought of it before. Lew Zealand was different than normal at the _Times_ because it wasn't really _him_ there. It was someone else, someone very cunning and good at both forgery _and_ mimicking voices...or _several_ persons. And I already knew exactly who it was—but that wasn't my problem now. I'd have to head back for Fozzie at Movin' Right Along, and then _I_ had a _murder_ to solve. This could probably wait for a little while. "Well, it was nice to meet you, Mr. Zealand," I remarked, standing up, and at his silent insistence I added, "_And_ your boomerang fish. But we really have to leave."

"Good-bye!" he called back cheerfully as Robin stood back up beside me. "Come visit me sometime! I got a _whole _lot more boomerang fish for you to meet!"

At least I had finally figured out what the heck Kermit had been talking about when he described his boss as walking around with his "fish".

As Robin and I departed from the lot, he started tugging on my sleeve again. "Miss Phyllis?" he asked worriedly. "Shouldn't we tell Uncle Kermit who his editor _really_ is?"

"So you came to that conclusion _too_, kiddo?" I inquired, and he nodded. "No, not yet. He's already got enough on his plate to deal with, and besides that I don't think that the Chief will accept any criminals that I bring in until I've gotten some concrete evidence on the murderer that he's supposedly already gotten." When Robin glanced at me confusedly, I said honestly, "I'll tell you later. I _promise_." My singular wonder was where I was going to get another clue as to who had committed the terrible crime of Sam the Eagle's murder.

———

**WALDORF**: Does she have short-term memory problems or something? It's OBVIOUS what she's supposed to do!

**STATLER**: SSHHH!! Keep it down, do you want her to HEAR?

**WALDORF**: I mean, there was that RECEIPT that they found at that stupid Happiness Hotel! It was all the rage until Chapter 17, then everyone FORGOT about it!

**STATLER**: No! Don't go any further!!

**WALDORF**: So OBVIOUSLY, they should finish trying to figure out what the thing was that those guys bought!

**STATLER**: AAAAAUGHHH!!

**WALDORF**: Oh, be quiet, she can't hear us from HERE!

———

Suddenly I remembered something that I'd forgotten about after Camilla had arrived on the apartment doorstep almost twenty-four hours ago. The _receipt_ from the first time we'd been at The Happiness Hotel, the one from Floyd's room with the name of a shady-sounding store that said that they'd bought a really expensive Muppet Labs product! I'd overlooked it after yesterday morning, but at last I now had a lead!

———

**STATLER**: AAAHH!! I TOLD you!

**WALDORF**: Oh, shut up...

———

I paused, though. At our visit to the Hotel yesterday, Floyd had been so..._nice_. _Uncharacteristically_ nice. Did I really _have_ to find out whether it had been him or some other guy who'd murdered Sam?

Then my thoughts drifted back to the heavily-disguised bear sitting in Movin' Right Along, ducking out of sight every time a policeman came by. If the Chief caught _him_, everything would be over and done with. I had no choice.

I sighed, and once we were substantially out of the vicinity of Doc Hopper's I turned to Robin. "You think you can get home from here all right, kiddo?"

Looking around, Robin nodded his head slowly. "Yeah," he answered, "I know my way back from that next corner."

"Good," I replied, and started down the street. "With any luck, I'll be able to tell you the story from the beginning soon," I called as the Red Car came into view, "and if I'm just a bit more fortunate, maybe it'll even have an ending."


	22. Chapter 22

**Chapter 22**: The El Sleezo After Lunch

**STATLER**: NOW you see where you've gotten us? If Phyllis Pepper hadn't remembered about that receipt, maybe the author would have gotten bored and stopped writing this stupid story! Waldorf, I DESPISE you!

**WALDORF**: ...Actually, if that Pepper hadn't remembered about the receipt, the author would probably have made up a bunch of other stuff to happen until the detective DID remember, and then it would take even LONGER for this to be over.

. . . . . . . . . .

**STATLER**: Waldorf, I LOVE you!

**WALDORF**: Sorry, I'm married.

———

After picking Fozzie up at Movin' Right Along, the two of us headed back to our still-demolished apartment for the Muppet Labs product lists. We pored over those for a few hours until we finished with the _entire_ couple-hundred-pages of stuff, and finally made the conclusion that, unless Floyd and the rest of The Electric Mayhem had suddenly become interested in owning around fifty pairs of "virtual reality glasses" from _The Wizard of Oz_, there was nothing Muppet Labs produced that could actually cost a hundred and fifty dollars and _also_ be of any use to them. So, meeting Kermit for his lunch break, we decided that the only way to find out what The Electric Mayhem had bought was to go directly to the source.

"How are we going to find this 'El Sleezo', Phyllis?" Kermit inquired as soon as we were out of _The Muppetburg Times_'s lobby, his dark gray trenchcoat wrapped tightly around him as protection from the draft. "I mean," he went on, "if it's an illegal place like you're thinking it is, then we probably won't find a sign just saying 'This way to buy things off the black market'!"

"We won't?" That was Fozzie, still as "Emmanuel Ravelli".

I dug furrows in my chin with my forefinger as I pondered. "There _must_ be someone who knows where it is," I offered eventually. "All we have to do is _find_ that person."

"We can't ask The Electric Mayhem," Kermit commented, pointlessly to me but obviously a source of discussion for Fozzie.

"Why not?" he protested. "They were nice yesterday, and maybe if we just told them the truth_ they'd_ tell us what we need to know!"

I sighed, kicking a pebble ahead of me on the pavement. In Fozzie's world, everything was simple and easy and straightforward. If only his optimism could infect the _rest_ of the world. "That doesn't work," I explained. "Wayne and Wanda were poor, not criminals, so they're right out. No one at the Theater could really help us, and even if one of the police officers _did_ happen to know where it was, our best bet would be to stay _away_ from them."

Fozzie bent his head in thought, and Kermit piped back up. "Oh yeah, Phyllis," he recalled, turning to me, "what was it that you were talking about on the phone? You were really sounding rushed, but you gave a perfect description of Mr. Zealand. What was that about?"

Out of the corner of my eye I made an update on Fozzie's condition, but he was pointedly ignoring the conversation. I'd instructed him back at the flat not to tell Kermit that I'd been to Doc Hopper's with Robin, because before I'd even be able to _start_ explaining Kermit would rag me out about taking Robin there. Besides, he didn't really need to know what I'd figured out..._yet_. I hadn't even told _Fozzie_. Only Robin knew, and that had been from his _own_ guesswork. Someday I'd have to ask Kermit to apprentice Robin to me as a detective.

"Nothing much," I shrugged indifferently. "Just saw some guy who kind of looked like that, and I thought his name sounded like 'Zealand'."

"Huh," Kermit commented. "That's funny."

We walked in silence for a while, trying to figure out how to find El Sleezo. I was drawing a blank, and by the thoughtful murmurings and shaking of heads I figured that Kermit and Fozzie weren't getting anywhere either. I sighed, then suddenly Kermit brightened up.

"Hey," he remarked, and my head as well as Fozzie's turned towards him.

"What?" Fozzie asked.

Kermit smiled and, pointing over to a small shoeshine stall on the sidewalks in front of us, announced, "_I_ don't know who might be able to give us directions, but I'll bet Shoeshine Scooter will!"

* * *

Shoeshine Scooter's was like a gift from whatever gods Muppets care to worship, be they Eren Ozkers or Steve Whitmires. The young Whatnot was the _perfect_ source of information _anywhere_, whether you were looking for anything from the location of old Laserdiscs or the answer to the Meaning of Life. (I actually asked him the second one once, and he gave me a very detailed answer—though I still have to figure out that part about young office gofers playing such a huge role.) Scooter's motormouth was always ready to go, and with only a little bribing you could hear about the personal lives of everybody in Muppetburg.

"Shine your shoes?" he asked as the three of us hurried up, and the mango-skinned kid brushed aside his stringy red hair to look at us. When he recognized me through his thick glasses, he straightened up and exclaimed, "Oh, Miss _Pepper!_ Need any new information?"

"Sort of," I commented, sitting down on one of the shoeshine chairs. The best way to deal with Scooter was to get a shoeshine first. That way, he wouldn't keep asking you to do just that while you were in the middle of a crucial investigation. Kermit and Fozzie, not _having_ shoes, just stood off to the side. "What's the word on the street, Scooter?" I asked, slipping him a fiver that I'd stuck in my wallet just before leaving the flat. Scooter took the money and put it in the pocket of his bright green jacket before taking out a brush and shoeshine. While he ducked over to start the polishing, I hurriedly beckoned Kermit and Fozzie over so they could hear. By the time the shoeshiner looked up to talk to me, my compatriots were both stationed just behind him.

"_Well_," Scooter began in a low voice, glancing from side to side warily, "the word on the street is that Edgar Bergen _isn't really dead_. You see, he crept out the back window by throwing his voice, and then after he joined the circus as a lion tamer called Ray Noble he—"

As good-sounding as the rumor might have been, it wasn't what I needed right now. "I was thinking more along the lines of," I muttered, leaning down near Scooter but looking in a another direction entirely, "_the case of the murder at Uncle Henson's Theater_."

"Oh, _that_," Scooter realized, and nodding his head vigorously he took out his brush and started scrubbing down my shoes. Fozzie was leaning interestedly over Scooter, and as soon as Scooter looked the other way again I waved furiously at Fozzie to get back before Scooter noticed his presence. Unfortunately, Scooter looked up while I was still in the midst of flapping my arms, so I just kind of embarrassedly slowed down and eventually let my arms hang limp at my sides.

"The murder?" I inquired to draw his attention away from the fool I was making of myself.

"Yeah, the _murder_," Scooter began again, and after once more bending to scrub hissed, "The cops are still looking for Fozzie Bear. He apparently gave them the slip last night—and it was in _your_ apartment building _too_, Miss Pepper."

"It was?" I asked innocently, as if I hadn't seen it all happen with my own eyes. "I must've been asleep."

Scooter chuckled and shook his head. "That'd be kind of hard to do, Miss Pepper," he commented cheerily, bending down to restock his brush. "Word on the street is the Chief of Police, Sweetums the Ogre, accidentally blew half the place up. City Hall's going to get wailed out about that one for sure."

"And my landlord is _just_ the guy to do it," I remarked, chuckling a little myself. Oh, City Hall _was_ going to get _completely_ wailed out if Uncle Deadly had anything to say about it. And all thanks to the dead-things smell courtesy of landing in a garbage heap.

———

**WALDORF**: It's amazing how many practical uses that has.

**STATLER**: Really?

_PUSH._

**WALDORF**: ...

**STATLER**: WHAT? You JUST SAID how practical it was! ...Oh no, you stay away, don't—

_PUSH._

**STATLER**: Yecch...

———

"But the thing is," Scooter went on, once more looking from side to side to make sure nobody was listening in—nobody, that is, except for a frog and a heavily-disguised bear, "most of the people in Muppetburg, if you asked them, would tell you that Fozzie was completely innocent!"

This was a startling revelation to me, and behind Scooter's back I could see Fozzie literally jumping for joy. "That _true?_" I demanded happily. "No _way!_ That's just what _I'm_ trying to prove! What makes them think that?"

"Well, for starters," Scooter elaborated, his scrubbing brush and shoe polish forgotten entirely in his fervor, "most of the people in town have had favors done for them by Fozzie for small change. He's reserviced rubber chickens, gotten old jokebooks off their hands and even performed at children's birthday parties!" Trailing off, he amended, "...Well, the _last_ one didn't go so well, but the fact is, that bear has the _popular_ vote! No matter _what_ evidence anyone might bring against him in court, as long as they keep regular citizens on the jury he'll be ruled 'Not Guilty'!"

I felt like cheering until Scooter sighed and dipped his brush in the polish. "But that couldn't happen," he lamented. "That would be considered a biased jury, and they'd review the ruling and get Fozzie the life sentence."

Foz ceased hopping up and down immediately.

Scooter, however, just shrugged it off and kept up with the shine job. "Well, that's the word on the street," he concluded, gazing up expectantly. "Anything else to hear, Miss Pepper?"

"As a matter of fact, yes," I replied, glancing around again before extracting from my wallet a ten. While Scooter gasped over the magnitude of the bill's value, I hoped desperately that I wouldn't have any more need for cash—that had been the last of my monetary supplement. "Do you know anyone who could direct us to a shop named 'El Sleezo'?"

" 'El Sleezo'?" Scooter repeated puzzledly. He half-turned around towards the row of seated customers waiting behind us. "Hey! Anyone here know where El Sleezo is?"

Most of the Muppets just shook their heads without even looking up from their magazines, but one character, a rat, glanced up from his copy of _The Muppetburg Times_. He was a bit taller than most rats I'd seen, and he had on a red varsity jacket with yellow sleeves. His eyes were sort of lidded, but he had on an eager expression. "Me!" he called, putting down his paper.

"All right, Rizzo," Scooter acknowledged the rat, turning back to me. "Miss Pepper, Rizzo. Rizzo, Miss Pepper."

"I can see," Rizzo returned, looking me over half-interestedly. "And I can see why she's a Miss too."

"Good for you," I congratulated through gritted teeth. How ironic—the guy who was going to bring me to a place that could condemn Floyd also had the same sense of humor as my cousin.

"I can't," Fozzie commented suddenly from behind Scooter. Scooter turned sharply at the voice.

"How long have you been standing there?" he demanded of Fozzie and Kermit, but I wasn't listening.

"You can't _what?_" I asked.

"I can't see why you're a Miss," Foz repeated straightforwardly, then shuffled his feet around on the ground a bit awkwardly. I myself felt the tips of my ears turn slightly more red, so I moved the conversation along past this clumsy roadblock.

"So then, Rizzo," I began quickly, "could you take us to El Sleezo within about ten minutes?" I still felt like I was boiling over at the face, but I knew after a while I'd go back down to normal temperature. "We have to get there and back in a short amount of time."

The rat paused to ponder the implications of such a project, then remarked, "Got any food on you?"

I looked around at Kermit and Fozzie, being empty-handed on those terms myself. Kermit pulled out the pockets of his coat to show how little he had of _everything_, but Fozzie, perhaps a little worriedly, extracted what looked like a bag of jellybeans out of the inside chest pocket of his striped zoot suit. Rizzo snapped them up instantly, pulling the bag out of Fozzie's hands and cramming as many into his mouth at one time as he possibly could. "Fo' thethse jewwybeansth," he mumbled past the candies, huge inside _his_ mouth, "you gefts thew' in lesths than five minutesth."

"Um...thank you," Kermit offered hesitantly, and we began to trail after him as the rat scampered off still with the bag.

"Hey Foz," I asked, "when'd you get _those? _I didn't think they had jellybeans at Movin' Right Along."

"They don't," he answered, fidgeting a little, then pulled an empty tin can out of his pocket. "Those were some old refried beans that were in the garbage disposal outside."

Kermit took a glance at our leader, still scarfing down his prize. "It's a good thing that he doesn't notice," he remarked, "or we'd have a very sick rat on our hands..."

———

**STATLER**: That would be any different from having a NORMAL rat with you HOW?

**RAT**: . . . .

**WALDORF**: Here, Statler, grab this broom.

**STATLER**: Why? I'm not doing any sweeping.

**WALDORF**: No, but judging by all these indignant rats I think you'll need it anyways.

———

We reached El Sleezo, just like Rizzo had predicted, in under five minutes and with plenty of time to spare. Sure, it had been a tight squeeze between those two fenceposts a while back there, and most of the "pathway" was _definitely_ meant for rats and _not_ humans, or frogs, or bears. But Rizzo got us there relatively in one piece, and when we arrived I could clearly see why only rats had such quick access to the store.

It was a _dump_, but that wasn't the problem. Sure, the paint was peeling, the wooden boards were rotting and the sign proclaiming "El Sleezo" was hung more crooked than a crook, but that was all _ordinary _stuff. The thing that got me the most was the _other_ sign out front:

"_All illegal! Black market all the way! No __ordinary__ stuff at __**the El Sleezo!**_"

Of course, all the "black-market"-y, sleazy and general _illegality_ of the whole place had been suspected and almost half-known before we had come here, but just to see them _proclaiming_ it so publicly was enough to shake _me_ into my boots.

"Hey Rizzo," I asked the rat, who was still munching down on what he _thought_ were jellybeans, "what kind of neighborhood is this?"

"Oh, _completely_ black market," he shrugged off past the food gorged in his cheeks. "Nothing here on this street sells _legal_ stuff."

"Then what's to stop us from going to the cops?" Kermit demanded before I could stop him. I groaned internally. _Now_ we were sunk.

"Well, for _one_ thing," Rizzo replied to my amazement, "they've all got permits."

I was utterly astounded. "_What?_"

"Permits," the rat repeated, shoving another fistful of the old refrieds into his mouth. "They got permits from City Hall to sell illegal items. I understand it's really just a loophole in the contract, but it's all legal for them to be _il_legal."

"And City Hall never _heard_ of this?" Fozzie gasped, his hand over his mouth.

"Nuh-uh." Rizzo kept eating regardless of _any_ sort of politeness now. "And with your help they _won't_, if you get my drift."

I think I did, so I shrugged it off. "Well then, thanks, Rizzo, you can go now."

"Oh, _can_ I?" he asked sarcastically, then after a few more treats he threw the empty bag away. "Oh, and by the way," the rat went on casually, "your wallet's empty, in case you didn't know."

Self-consciously I reached for my wallet, but it wasn't in my pocket where I'd left it. I panicked, trying to find it. I couldn't lose that wallet, it had my index card report on Koozbanian aliens in there!

"Ahem," Rizzo coughed, and handed me my wallet. I took it in realization of what had just occurred.

"You _rat!_" I cried out, ready to attempt strangulation at a moment's notice.

"I try," he replied modestly, then turned on his tail and left without another word. I just watched him go, speechless with indignation and still recovering from the shock of being handed your own wallet by a _perfect stranger_.

———

**WALDORF**: Yeah. Nothing's as shocking as somebody else telling you what's in your own wallet.

**STATLER**: Oh yeah, speaking of, did you know that you have three twenties in here? WOO-EE!

———

Fozzie began tugging on my sleeve. "C'mon, Phyllis," he insisted, "we have to go in."

"...Sure," I replied slowly, getting my jaws to move properly again, and reached into the pocket of my trenchcoat. Ducking out of the way of El Sleezo's singular window, I donned the sunglasses, hat, neckerchief and gloves from my other disguise, turning up the collar of my coat as I did so. Like in the underground musician home, I wasn't sure that this store would really _accept_ non-Muppets.

We pushed in the door carefully, and a bell started tinkling as we did so. The sound alerted a relaxing figure behind the dingy, rotted cashier's desk, who sat up immediately. "Need help?" he asked. He was a sickly, pale green, with a head shaped kind of like Kermit's only longer. Two heavily lashed, bulbous yellow eyes peered up at us, and a few very sharp teeth protruded from his mouth. He was wearing a nametag that read, as best as I could see through the blacked-out sunglasses, "Lenny the Lizard".

"No, just looking," Kermit called back, and we began to shuffle carefully around the small, badly-lit store. There were piles upon piles of items stacked up across the entire place, most of which there was only one or a few of on display and all at exorbitant prices. I nearly doubled over when I saw how much a bottle of Pepto-Bismol cost here—but then, it _was_ illegal.

When we had gone as far out of the cashier's earshot as was possible in the cramped place, I turned to my companions. "Remember," I hissed, "it has to say 'Muppet Labs' on it, and the price tag _has_ to be within a few dollars of a hundred and fifty."

Seemingly discreet, we all started drifting apart from each other into separate corners of the store. We had to get this done fast so Kermit could get back to the _Times_ before his break was over, also taking into account the possibility of getting lost without Rizzo. I went towards the corner farthest from the door, just off to the side of the lizard. We had discussed that plan before: in case it got to the point that we'd have to _escape_, Fozzie would be closest to the door but farthest from wherever the cashier was. Kermit would stay discreetly near him in order to help, if need be. And I would be as far from them as would be safe, so if anything came to that they would _definitely_ be able to get out, whereas I had the chance of being forced to remain as forfeit. That hadn't been how I had presented the idea, but the possibility as well as the resolve to face it if it came was present at least in _my_ mind.

I scoured my corner of the store, looking very thoroughly high and low to try to find something that might have matched the criteria of the receipt. I came up empty for the most part. Nothing in my vicinity was labeled "Muppet Labs" in any way, shape or form. There were _several_ items within the scheduled price range, and even more _above_ that. Stubbornly, I combed over my entire corner once, twice, three times—but still no results. Sighing, after I'd read the price tag on a bootleg "Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear" costume so many times that I felt like _it_ was tap-dancing on my brain, I sauntered casually over to Kermit's spot, where he and Fozzie had already regrouped.

"Nothing," Kermit hissed, glancing warily at Lenny. He needn't have bothered, as the cashier was relaxing and reading a magazine again. "Nothing that _they_ might have wanted bad enough to get it here."

"The whole display in the middle is Muppet Labs stuff, though, Phyllis," Fozzie informed, cautiously lifting up his sunglasses to make sure that, yes, he _was_ looking at me and not some other person dressed _up_ as me. Relowering the glasses, he indicated towards the pile. I glanced at it from where we were standing, and took Fozzie's remark at face value. "But none of it costs a hundred and fifty, and none of it would probably be interesting for Floyd and the rest."

"I came up empty too," I was forced to admit. "And there were no Muppet Labs items on that list that would correspond with a black-market store, either. Maybe it was a stupid idea to—"

I didn't even get to finish my demoralizing thought before Fozzie piped up again. "You know," he commented, cocking his head and scratching it, "none of the Muppet Labs stuff here was on the half of the list that I'd gotten."

"Hm," I exhaled, not really paying much heed to it. "They were probably from my side of the pile then."

"No, I don't think so," Fozzie went on, thinking so hard that he looked like he was in physical pain. I glanced at him in only semi-interest, but then I heard his next words: "Actually, a lot of them had these packages that said 'Our New Black Market Line' on them. But that's probably nothing..."

I ran over to the Muppet Labs display immediately, and, taking a quick glance to make sure Lenny wasn't looking, I lifted up my sunglasses and read the labels on all the packages. Sure enough, they all said something along the lines of what Fozzie had recited, and I hadn't seen absolutely _any_ of them on my half of the list either. This was a startling surprise. Dr. Honeydew had said that El Sleezo hadn't sounded like a store that Muppet Labs supplied to, and Dr. Strangepork as well as Beaker had verified that. So how...? Never mind, I didn't have time for that now. I had to go over every price tag on the display in search of one that read one-fifty. Though Fozzie had occasionally shown very good perception skills, I wanted to see for myself.

And I did: there _were_ none that either matched any possible needs of The Electric Mayhem or the price. I sighed, momentarily defeated. "What should we do?" I asked Kermit. "Any ideas?"

"I..." he began, then his shoulders slumped. "None," he confessed blearily. I felt like banging my head against the wall. We were _so close!_ So close and we couldn't even _get_ there!

———

**STATLER**: Like US trying to ESCAPE from this story!

**WALDORF**: Keep going, Statler, eventually these chains have GOT to catch fire!

**STATLER**: Well, it would kind of help if I actually had a MATCH!

**WALDORF**: Oh, that brick I gave you doesn't burn well enough?

———

"Can I see the receipt, Phyllis?" Fozzie requested, tugging on my sleeve again. Almost automatically, barely thinking about it at all, I pulled it out of my pocket and handed it to him.

"Sure," I replied, then as soon as I let go I queried, "Why?"

I was too late—Fozzie strode confidently with the receipt all the way over to the cashier's desk and gave it to Lenny. I was going to shout after him, but as Kermit and I panicked and hurried over there to him he was already asking, "What can you tell us about the product on this receipt?"

"FO—" I started violently, but Kermit clapped a hand over my neckerchiefed mouth before I even got that far.

"Let's wait and see, Phyllis," he whispered confidently. "Anything is possible."

Even so, he had to keep his hand in place or risk me losing my head again as the cashier scratched his head. "Um...where did you get this receipt?" the lizard asked, looking up through his lashes.

"A friend gave it to us by accident," Kermit broke in hastily, positioned as casually as one can be when you're covering the approximate location of a masked figure's mouth, a masked figure who is _much_ taller.

Lenny looked like he was about to ask a very stupid question, but instead he just pulled out a little slip like the same sort of stationary that had been used on the receipt. "OK..." he mumbled, then glanced back up. "About what day was it, and who were the recipients?"

"Um...before two days ago," Fozzie answered, taking off his hat. "And they were...uh..._The Electric Mayhem_."

Lenny stared at the piece of paper with a furrowed brow. "Is that this Sergeant Floyd Pepper? Purple skin, sunglasses, long reddish-orangey hair?"

I nodded emphatically, feeling left out of the conversation. When that particular detail had been straightened out, Lenny showed us the slip. "They were in here a couple days ago," he explained. "Big purchase. They'd saved a lot of money for it—filled up the cashbox. Didn't even consider the installment plan, though they'd been looking at it for a little while before."

Kermit finally removed his hand from over my mouth, and I was able to talk. "What did they buy?" I asked breathlessly, and perhaps with a bit of fear as to the answer.

Taking his first minute during the entire trip to actually _look_ at me, Lenny at first didn't seem like he was going to answer. But he shrugged off my appearance easily enough, without me even having to give that story about a skin condition—guess you get _all_ types in an illegal storefront. "Oh, that was one of our _best_ shipments," he related. "A little limited, but enough of a demand out there to make that stretch!" The lizard wavered, then changed his answer. "Well, all right, the Sergeant and the rest of them were the first people to buy it, but soon we'll be able to get _all_ of them off our hands."

"May we see one?" Kermit ventured cautiously.

"Sure," Lenny shrugged, and reaching down he pulled a singular crate out from underneath his desk. "It's not too big," he huffed as he plunked it on top of the desk, "but it sure packs a heck of a wallop!"

Though Lenny seemed bright and cheery about it, I was growing apprehensive as I grasped the box with both hands. Fozzie and Kermit were both looking over interestedly on either side of me as I rotated the package. All I could really see was the corrugated cardboard box, sealed with duct tape and printed on with fine blue ink. The writing proclaimed stuff like "Illegal fun for the whole family!" and "Bring some black-market taste into _your_ home!", all sorts of messages that wouldn't exactly hold up in a newspaper ad. Then, finally, I got to the side where they printed the product name—and, with a jolt in every fiber of my being, I saw what it was that Floyd and The Electric Mayhem had been doing, and what Pépe had been so scared of us discovering.

"_Muppet Labs Radio Wave Overrider_"

My cousin was hacking the radios.

———

**STATLER**: Oh NO!

**WALDORF**: STATLER! Are you going SOFT? You're feeling BAD that that Floyd guy is doing something illegal?

**STATLER**: What are you TALKING about? I'm "Oh NO!"ing because I just realized that all this time I've been sitting on a tack!


	23. Chapter 23

**Chapter 23**: Confrontation

I immediately tore out of the store, running down the street at a breakneck pace. I could hear both Kermit and Fozzie calling out for me from behind, but I didn't listen to whatever it was they were saying. I didn't want anyone with me right then, but there was just one person I had to find: Floyd.

Regardless of traffic lights, regardless of sidewalks, regardless of any Muppet in my way I plunged through this side of the outskirts of Muppetburg to the other side, wherein I found the old sewer tunnels again. Considering my state of mind, it was amazing that I was able to navigate myself there without mishap—it was like a bull getting in and out of a china shop without causing grief to the owner. Pausing only for a moment to make sure that Kermit and Fozzie weren't following after, I ducked into the sewer opening and instead of crawling I ran hunchbacked all the way through.

"Hey, who do you—" began the bouncer when I came up to him, but I refused to slow down and instead bowled him over, sending him down to his back with a slight _splash_ to the floor of the cavern.

"J. CHEEVER LOOPHOLE!" I shouted back without turning at all, and made a beeline for The Happiness Hotel.

I almost literally crashed through the doorway of the Hotel, startling several of the occupants. I didn't apologize. My mind was too cluttered, too confused, too much like a washing machine at full spin cycle for me to process anything—except perhaps that even my violent entrance didn't wake Pops at his desk.

Barreling past two U-shaped, pink-and-orange striped Muppets I later recognized as the players of the number "Java" at the Theater, I headed for the door to the room of The Electric Mayhem. Not even thinking rationally at this point, I just grabbed the doorhandle and without breaking stride pushed the door in. I had expected it to be locked or at least jammed, which was why when it opened quite smoothly my momentum sent me sprawling on the floor. Dazedly, I saw Animal tethered to the wall and sitting in his cardboard box, Janice sitting on her pink beanbag chair tanning herself with a sun lamp, Dr. Teeth counting up a very small pile of money and Zoot lying casually on one of the beanbags on the fold-out bed, fingering his saxophone. I only had a moment to fully take in all these things, because the moment after I landed on the floor I straightened back up. "Where's Floyd?" I demanded, not even using the fake voice.

Dr. Teeth's eyes had widened upon my arrival, but he didn't seem shaken up. "Why do you wanna know," he asked, "and why'd you bust right in?"

"WHERE IS HE?" I shouted.

Animal's eyes opened up fully as he stared fixedly at me. "Phyl-lis...?" I heard him inquire, though no one else seemed to hear him.

"You can't see 'im, man," Zoot wheezed, surprisingly sternly. "Come back later..._then_ convince us."

"Not later!" I protested, and in a wave of wild desperation I tore off my sunglasses and neckerchief, baring to them my face. "Does _this_ convince you?" I retorted sharply.

I was greeted with shocked silence, and in this severe absence of sound I heard another noise: barking, accompanied by Floyd swearing like the Dickens. Homing in on the source of the clamor, I flew to a door that I had never previously seen in this room and threw it open. Inside was Floyd, with a little white poodle hanging off the end of his brown pants. "—dog!" he was cursing, panting for breath as he tried to shake it off his leg and into a little doggy bed lying beneath him. "—not worth the trouble to get at that pig—"

He stopped short when he saw me standing there, and his eyes widened in astonishment before they narrowed in suspicion. "PHYLL!" he cried out, dropping the dog that he had finally bodily detached from himself. Coming out of the closet and shutting the door on the distressed pooch, Floyd looked me over and saw the glasses and neckerchief that I was still clutching. "Wait...so all along, you—"

"Floyd," I burst in, relieved that he was there and yet still half hysterical, "we have to talk."

He sounded like he had just changed his mind in mid-response. "Why?" he requested warily, his fellow musicians still witnessing the exchange in the background.

I sucked in a deep breath. "Will you talk with me?"

Looking helplessly around at his comrades, who were all stuck for answers too, Floyd eventually sighed. "All right, cus," he exhaled, leading me over to the bed where Zoot was sitting. The saxophonist quickly sat up to give the two of us room to sit down as the rest of The Electric Mayhem congregated around us. "So," Floyd prompted, "what's on your mind?"

Closing my eyes, I announced straight out, "I know you're hijacking radio broadcasts to get your music on the air."

Without opening my eyes I could feel all of them tense up around me, even Janice. I hurried through the whole rest of my speech, feeling a need to get all of it out as soon as possible. "I know you bought the Muppet Labs Radio Wave Overrider at El Sleezo. I know you had a shaky relationship with Sam the Eagle, and that all of you guys were big adversaries of his. And now I know that you kidnapped Miss Piggy's prize poochie Foo-Foo, whether to annoy her or blackmail her or what I still have to hear." Taking another deep breath, I opened my eyes again. The group, even Animal, seemed more cagey and simply shell-shocked than murderous right now. That was a good thing. "My question is," I breathed heavily, "why?"

All was silent for a few more minutes, then Floyd stared down at the hands in his lap. He took a deep breath and expelled, "Phyll, you always were the perceptive one in the family. It's all true."

This statement, however inconsequential it might have sounded, had a phenomenal effect on The Electric Mayhem. "_Floy_-yyyd!" Janice protested. "I mean, this is like _drag city!_ Why are we like _telling_ her?"

"Yeah, Floyd!" Dr. Teeth objected, waving his long arms at Floyd. His feathered top hat was wobbling precariously on his head. "You _crazy_ or something?"

"Not crazy, Dr. Teeth," Floyd sighed, not meeting any of their eyes, "cornered, and gonna tell the truth."

Animal surprised me by agreeing. "Truth!" he howled, banging his head against the wall. "TRUTH TRUTH!"

I waited patiently and calmly, knowing that if I spoke it might break my chances forever of patching up with Floyd—and of hearing what he had to say. After he'd finished bickering with his pals over whether or not I was going to hear all this. "Well, Phyll," Floyd started, "...I guess it all started when we got our first outside contract for a gig." He sighed in remembrance. "We were gonna play for a ship that was gonna set sail and look for buried treasure. But Sam wouldn't let us go, 'cus that clashed with the program of the Theater." Floyd paused to grit his teeth. "So we had to give up the gig, and they got some guy called Tim Curry instead. Then it was—it was—" He stopped short. "What was the one after that?"

Zoot scratched his head. "Hey man, wasn't that for the other nightclub, The Poppy Fields?"

"No, I mean it was for, like, the Christmas party for the guy at the rubber chicken factory," Janice corrected, throwing her locks over her shoulder with a flick. "Then it was for that college play."

"No way, man," Zoot countered, holding up his saxophone in self-defense. "After _that_ it was the bar mitzvah, you know, when we bought all those black suits and learned all that Jewish talk for _nothing_, just so they could replace us for a guy in a _cannon?_"

"Not The Great Gonzo?" I was compelled to ask.

"Nah, that wasn't him," Dr. Teeth answered, scratching his head with his amazingly humanlike hands. "That one was just before that time when we _almost_ got to play for that bus tour of London!"

"LON-DON!" Animal cried out, liking the sound of the word. "LON-DON! LONDON LONDON!"

"Well, the point _is_," Floyd shouted above the growing cacophony, "we kept getting asked to do gigs, but Sam wouldn't let us out of the contract." He scoffed. "Who _says_ all these little nightclub sideshows become big-name TV stars? But we...well," he trailed, "look at us, we live in The Happiness Hotel. I mean, man, if this is the _happiness_, I'd hate to see the _sad_ one!"

———

**STATLER**: Hey, they used that line in the movie!

**WALDORF**: Wait a second, you REMEMBER that line?

**STATLER**: Yeah, yeah...but the point is, that's the same line as from THE GREAT MUPPET CAPER! Someone should SUE this crackpot for that! Actually, someone should sue her over this entire STORY! I mean, my likeness is COPYRIGHTED! ...Yeah, let's get a bunch of lawyers and let's SUE her! What do you think of that, Waldorf? ...Waldorf?

**WALDORF**: Hey, I'm still getting over the fact that you remember that line!

———

"...Well," Floyd went on, "anyways, you see where we've got to live. We couldn't hire a lawyer or anything to get us a loophole. 'Sides, anyone with even just half a brain could see that Sam's contract was even tighter than his wallet. ...If that was _possible_."

"The performers' salaries were decreasing because Sam was donating money to charities," I informed him offhandedly. "Before he had had to pay for Wayne and Wanda's mishaps, he had been able to support these fundraisers from his own cash, but since he became responsible for paying for _those_ two he had to 'borrow' money from all of you."

They all just stared at me in astonishment for another moment, then Zoot laughed strainedly. "Hey, man," he announced to Floyd, half-smiling, "I'd like to 'borrow' your cousin for a few evenings, I think I'll look for the secret of life and see if she can find it for me."

"Don't forget about whether or not the light stays on when you close the refrigerator door," Dr. Teeth cracked. "I've got my money on _yeah!_"

"Actually, the light goes off," I announced sheepishly. "I asked Shoeshine Scooter last week, and he'd happened to have shined the shoes of a refrigerator maker."

This burst everyone into another round of laughter, but Floyd continued with his account when we'd settled. "So, well, we was pretty mad at the' Eagle," he recommenced. "Well, who _wouldn't_ be? We had to find some way to reach our _true_ audience, not just some nightclubbers to whom we're just _backup_ for the other acts. So, one day, we happened to go into El Sleezo."

"SLEE-ZO," Animal parroted...once more pardoning the species barrier.

"Right there in the window," Floyd breathed, settling back against one of the beanbag chairs, "was the Overrider. It was the most _beautiful_ thing we'd ever seen." Janice made a noise behind him, and turning, Floyd apologized, " 'Cept you, of course, Jan. But anyways, it was too out of our price range, so we couldn't buy it."

"How did you eventually get it?" I inquired.

He exhaled again. "Saved up for a month," Floyd recited. "All our paycheck, betting on pool, maybe a little gambling, but we all came out good. Got enough for the wonderful device, just a few nights before you came to the Theater with the frog. Sure, we used it a couple times to get in touch with our new loyal listeners, but we had nothing to do with Sam's...you-know-what."

"You had to excruciatingly time it so that the switch between _legal_ radio and you didn't cut in choppily by somehow bribing one of the DJs into telling you their exact broadcast schedule," I elaborated, thinking out loud. Floyd nodded, and so did Animal, Janice, Zoot and Dr. Teeth. I tried to relax a little from my rigid posture, but it didn't work so I just stayed in that position. "But as for not having to do with Sam's murder," I cut in, tensing a little in apprehension, "Miss Piggy already testified that she saw the group of you heading out of your dressing room towards Sam's office a few minutes before the murder was discovered."

Floyd blinked, then swore again. "Stupid pig," he muttered, then looked up. "All right, you got us. We were there, just as Porky said. But we didn't have anything to do with it!"

Zoot, also to my surprise, tapped Floyd gently on the shoulder from his reclining position perpendicular to the bass guitarist. "Dude," he wheezed at me tiredly, maybe a little solemnly, "we _were_ actually gonna bump off the Eagle that night."

I went into total shock again. "You WHAT?" I protested, and Floyd as well as the other members of his band jumped up in alarm. However, Zoot inclined his head and let us calm down before he went on.

"Floyd already said how much we were mad at the eagle," he announced seriously, "so we _were_ actually going to do it. But when we was outside his office door, well, we didn't have the heart for it. So we took Animal out for a walk instead, then headed back to the Hotel to try out the Overrider again. We only heard about, well, Sam when _you_ came into that diner and said that _we_ did it."

I lowered my eyes. "Well, I..." I started ashamedly, "I'm sorry about that. I just thought since you hadn't been brought back to the Theater with the other performers..." But now I could see the signs clearly from that afternoon: they'd seemed more guilty when I'd accused them of not having been retrieved to the Theater than when I'd told them about Sam. And as well, Floyd had said "_Whoever_ had killed Sam" as opposed to "Fozzie", so he _couldn't_ have known about the police investigation or, for that fact, the death. Wayne and Wanda had even testified that whether they were guilty or not, the police wouldn't have been able to find them in The Happiness Hotel. All this time, and I had been barking up the wrong tree...and no rational thinking to tell me otherwise. And I had _almost_ clapped my cousin in irons for _murder!_ But I might have to get him shut away with anyways, what with this radio business...

"But as for the dog," I realized, "well...what about him?"

Floyd started in surprise with the sudden change of pace. "Ah, the mutt?" he inquired, making a nasty face, "well, Sam had said that someone had to take care of the dog while that Miss Piggy rehearsed for her"—he said with disdain and loathing—"_act_. And who do you suppose that responsibility was put off to but dear old Sergeant Floyd?" His expression turned even more sour. "So I kidnapped the pooch so I'd have at least _somethin'_ against the pig, but it's getting worse by the day." Floyd heaved a hefty sigh. "You can take 'im back to the pig for all I care. Just don't say about me, yeah?"

"I can understand why not," I commented, patting my stomach. It had been compressed more times under Miss Piggy's karate chop in the past few days than a wayward bicycle under a steamroller.

———

**STATLER**: Huh! I don't blame him either! That Miss Piggy is a real HAM when she's COOKED! Heh heh heh!

. . . . . . .

**STATLER**: Well, come on, Waldorf, don't you agree?

**WALDORF**: ...And you say you know EXACTLY which movie that line was from?

———

Floyd sniggered, and some of the rest of the Mayhem joined in. "So, you don't like the porker either, do you?"

I thought for a little while, then answered as best as I could. "Actually," I confessed, "she's pretty rough and vain and self-obsessed, but, she's growing on me. Just a _little_ bit," I amended after spotting the look of horror crossing Floyd's face, "but all the same...a few days ago, though, and I would have joined the 'Miss Piggy Anti-Fan Club'."

"That so." Floyd seemed more impressed by my ability to be able to somewhat like Miss Piggy than downcast that I disagreed with him on the matter.

I stood up. "I'll try and take the dog with me now," I offered, winding my neckerchief around the lower half of my face again. "I'll figure out some way to get him to Miss Piggy so I can avoid an explanation." Replacing my sunglasses too, I went back to the closet and somehow managed to get Foo-Foo into the little doggy bed without too much physical pain.

Like doggy like Piggy.

Carrying the dog-in-dog bed with both arms, I kind of teetered a little from the weight but got myself repositioned so that I was straight up-and-down again. "Well," I called kind of awkwardly, trying to figure out something I could say, "thanks for talking to me."

Heading for the door, I was stopped by a call of "Wait up a sec, Phyll!" from Floyd. I turned as well as I could, cocking my head to show that yes, I _was_ listening.

"It's just," he tried with some difficulty to get the words to me, "well, when you was singin' yesterday...I liked it." For one of the first times that I had heard him speak to me, I could hear clear sincerity in his speech. "You should sing more often."

I knew that if I hung around much longer it would just embarrass him more, so I simply smiled instead. "Thank you." And as quickly as I could while still being polite, I exited the room.

* * *

After I'd left the Hotel and the rest of the underground world, I just wandered aimlessly for hours on end. I stopped in Movin' Right Along, but no Rowlf, not even after three triple-cream sodas—on the _rocks_. I didn't head back to our apartment, not back to the Theater, not even to Shoeshine Scooter's or El Sleezo in case Fozzie and Kermit were waiting for me there, Fozzie with his amazing internal clock probably asking Kermit "Why isn't she back yet after six-thirty?"

I had to be alone with my thoughts.

Of all my suspects for Sam's murder, every one of them had an alibi of some sort. Sure, that Swedish chef had a murder weapon—the musket he used in his cooking—but no motive, at least not that I could understand through his incomprehensible speech. Fozzie I still wanted to believe was innocent. Miss Piggy and Gonzo had been part of a frame-up. The costume lady, Hilda...from what I'd heard of her she couldn't hurt a fly if her _life_ depended on it. Wayne and Wanda's alibis checked out. The Electric Mayhem were involved in a whole _different_ illegal enterprise, even though they _did_ have a perfect motive.

I sighed, aimlessly wandering the streets. As for Lew Zealand...well, I had to prove my credulity in dealing with this murder before I could expose the fraud with any favorable results. Well, maybe the culprit wasn't one of my suspects after all...but that left the whole cast at Uncle Henson's Theater in suspicion, if not even the whole town of Muppetburg! The only lead I had been able to kick around at all had been first the packet of matches from Mr. Bassman, followed by that receipt. And now _that_ had been done away with. What sort of clues were left for me to try and follow?

I felt my feet pause of their own accord, and I realized that I was standing outside my own office. The tiny, dingy little shop had only the one door, and a rotten one at that with just a little rusted placard on the door. The light was on, as I could see from the large side windows, and I could hear the shuffling of a mop inside. Sighing, I decided to go inside. I had been away from the office for too long, and I felt guilty about it. I might as well check in just for the heck of it.

As I slid open the door to the main room, I saw George the janitor look up at me. I nodded "hello". He was a humanoid, with a face like a bulldog, gray hair that was also balding (though he refused to admit it) and a large nose. His janitorial uniform was a two-piece dark gray suit with his name sewed on the back in cursive. I saw that he hadn't gotten to the inner office yet; there were two rooms, one the waiting room, which we were in, and my personal office space. That's where I had received Fozzie on that fateful day, and gotten me into this huge mess...

"Hey, Miss Pepper," George interjected in a husky, strained voice, pausing to scrub vigorously at a particularly offensive spot on the hardwood floor, "there was a bear over here a coupla' nights ago to see ya'. He left a while later, though."

"I know, George," I sighed. "I've seen about him already."

"Oh," he grunted indifferently, then kept mopping. I carefully sidestepped out of the way. "And there was this other guy last night, in a police uniform," George went on. "Big guy, hairy, with a club. Asked where you were, and I let him in your office. He left too, though."

"Thank you," I acknowledged, trying to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. So _George_ had been responsible for showing the Chief to my apartment for that surprise investigation, even _unwittingly!_

"Oh, and there's some guy in there waiting for you now," George cut in again, startling me out of my thoughts. He shook his head in amazement. "Funny guy. Can't remember too well anything, just that he wanted to tell you something."

"Do you know who he is?" I asked.

"Nope." George shook his head, still mopping away. "But you can just go in, he's been there for a few minutes."

"Thanks, George." It was probably someone missing some sort of pet again. I might as well go in, seeing as I had no way to avoid it. Sighing, I grasped the doorknob of my office door, the one that said "Phyllis Pepper, Private Eye" on the glass of the window.

"Could you be Phyllis Pepper, the private investigator?"

I stopped dead when I saw exactly who it was sitting in my huge, red-canvased chair. How could that _be?_ I mean, well...it was _impossible_. Unless there were another way around it, and there actually was—

Well, I'd get the story within a matter of minutes. But one thing was certain: if the Muppet in my office really was who it appeared to be, this whole case was about to be, as Crazy Harry would say, blown wide open.


	24. Chapter 24

**Chapter 24**: All Is Revealed

**STATLER**: Look, Waldorf, you can't hang onto this forever. I DO remember that line, all right? So just LET IT GO! You'll eventually forget about it anyways!

**WALDORF**: ...What line? What're we talking about?

**STATLER**: SEE?

**WALDORF**: Huh?

———

Almost an hour later I was in Movin' Right Along again, but this time I was ordering around a host of police officers. "Clear out the restaurant of customers!" I called out. "We need all the space!" Turning around, I apologized, "I'm sorry, Uncle Deadly, but this is really important. I'll pay you back any way you want..."

The dragon, fully dressed once more in his tattered, brown suit coat, waved it off. "The fact that there will be a murderer present," he announced softly, almost menacingly, "is enough for me."

As Muppy and Crazy Harry got all of the patrons filing out the door, I turned back to the rest of the force. Beauregard was coming in the door just then, leading along Miss Piggy, Gonzo and Camilla. "What is the _meaning_ of this?" the pig snapped when she spotted me. "_Moi_ was just sitting in the Theater and this _lug_," she threw her head back, indicating Beauregard, "_forced_ me down here!"

"All will be revealed," I answered calmly, "in due time. Please take a seat at one of the tables. We still have to wait for more guests."

"Aw, cheer up, Piggy," I could hear Gonzo saying in the background, "I think this is _cool_. Don't you, Camilla?"

I made sure that they were firmly seated before I turned to inspect the other happenings. They were still bringing in more and more of the people I had sent for. Soon I heard the doors swing open again, and I saw Baskerville ushering in a very confused Dr. Honeydew along with Beaker and Dr. Strangepork. "Miss Pepper!" Dr. Honeydew cried out, hurrying over. Beaker prattled away in his high-strung voice, worried not least by the presence of the police.

"I'm sorry to divert you from your studies, Doctors, Beaker," I apologized before anyone could start asking questions, "but this is important and I need _everyone_ to hear. Please sit down and wait."

Dr. Honeydew tried to protest, but Strangepork led him over to a table without a qualm and the three were soon seated at the opposite end of the small section I had squared off. Several more people were entering now as some police Whatnots escorted the Swedish chef, Hilda, Wayne, Wanda, Mahna Mahna, Marvin Suggs and the two old hecklers into the room. I saw to it that they were seated too, as were Shoeshine Scooter, Rizzo and Rowlf when they came in. I didn't let anyone ask me any questions, just directed them to sit. After a while I felt a heavy tap on my shoulder, and I looked up to the Chief's not-so-happy face. "Hey, what's going on here?" he demanded.

"I found the murderer," I stated simply. "Haven't you ever seen the _Thin Man_ movies? You've got to get all the suspects into one room, reveal the murderer and watch the guilty party prove himself—or herself—that they're the one who did it."

"Sounds awfully _human_ to me," Chief Sweetums growled menacingly.

"It is," I replied. "Now, could you round up these people for me—"

As soon as the Chief was reluctantly on his way, the door flew open again and Kermit rushed in. "Phyllis!" he shouted, running up to me with Robin on his heels. In a surprise move, he wrapped his froggy arms around me for a tight, brief hug. "I thought something _terrible_ had happened when you ran from that store! You can't _imagine_—"

"I'm really sorry about that, Kermit," I apologized guiltily as he broke away, and I tried to smile as I patted Robin on the head. "But did you bring them?"

The sight of Floyd, Zoot, Dr. Teeth, Janice and Animal wandering cautiously in through the double doors was answer enough for me. I waved them over and directed them to be seated. I then turned back to Kermit and Robin. "Sit down, please," I instructed him, then with perhaps a little regret I waved at a specific table. "Miss Piggy's over there, if that's where you want to be."

Looking back at me a little confusedly, Kermit nevertheless made his way back to where the pig was preening herself. I carefully turned away from the spot, and instead found myself looking at Robin. "What's going on, Miss Phyllis?" he asked.

I smiled a little once more and lifted him up into the air. "Our troubles will be over soon, Robin," I informed him, putting him down on the ground again. "If you'll just sit down and wait, I'm sure you'll find this story rather compelling."

I had to wait a few more minutes before the Chief came back with the office rats from _The Muppetburg Times_. "Please sit down, gentlemen," I enjoined, then noticed with sly interest both that they seemed rather nervous _and_ that they all seated themselves by Rizzo.

At last everyone had arrived, and when things quieted down I turned to the Chief. "Now, I know this request seems a little suspicious," I whispered, "but when the _next_ Muppet comes in, I want you to _promise_ that you and your force won't handcuff him on sight."

I had luckily caught the Chief at a moment when he hadn't been giving me his undivided attention, because he automatically replied, "OK" before realizing what he'd just done. "Hey, _wait_ a minute—" he started, but I had already made my way to the front of the room where all the chairs were facing. As soon as the last of the guests had quieted down, I made my small speech.

"Now, ladies and gentlemen," I called out, "please listen very carefully." Every head in the audience turned towards me, and I had to hold down a well of self-consciousness to be able to say my next bit. "May I please introduce to you—MR. FOZZIE BEAR."

Several in the watching group of Muppets gasped as I led by the hand a very worried Fozzie out from a private room off to the side—an undisguised Fozzie, in his own necktie and hat.

"That's _him!_" the Chief shouted. "Get—"

He didn't even finish the sentence, as I stepped in. "You promised that you wouldn't handcuff him," I accused sharply, and got no small satisfaction from seeing the Chief flinch at my tone of voice. "Only when I present the true murderer may the force make their arrest."

"What's going on, Phyllis?" Fozzie whispered panickedly to me. "I mean, I went and found the guy you said to, but—"

"Later," I hissed, and led him over to an adjacent table as far as I could manage to get him from the cops. Once he was sitting, I surveyed the seating arrangement. As far as I could see, most of the Theater personnel were sitting in the section that from my point of view was the right, whereas everyone else—the Muppet Labs crew, Scooter, Uncle Deadly and such—was seated on the left side. The Electric Mayhem were somewhere in the middle a little in front of the hecklers, dividing the two sectors, and Kermit and Robin were sitting at a table with Miss Piggy. All of the policemen were standing in the back, and absolutely _everyone_ had their eyes on me.

"Folks," I began, standing as straight and tall as I could, "I have brought you here tonight to unveil a murderer."

This elucidated almost as much reaction from the crowd as my introduction of Fozzie, and everyone started talking at once. I held up my hands in an attempt for silence, and after a few seconds it worked. Everyone had stopped talking except for Janice. "—and so, I like said, I can't like _stand_ all these jokes about me and the nudist colonies—" she was saying, but when she realized that she was alone in speaking she quieted down _really_ fast.

"Thank you, Janice," I commented, then started pacing up and down in front of my enraptured listeners. "So, as I have said, I am about to reveal a murderer," I went on, trying to gauge the audience's reaction. None to speak of. "But before I can do that, I have a little _story_ to tell."

———

**STATLER**: Yeah? HOW little a story?

**WALDORF**: Heh heh heh!

———

"I would thank you to be quiet, sirs!" I warned the old geezers, then I began to pace again. "My story," I started, "began in my office three days ago, when I was paid a visit by a comedian who was suspicious of the actions of his boss. That comedian was Fozzie, and his boss was Sam."

"That's all we need—CUFF HIM, BOYS!" the Chief shouted, but at a look from me all of his inferior officers halted their charge towards Fozzie, who once more ducked behind me for safety.

"Patience is a virtue, Chief," I cautioned him. "And virtue will always hand you a reward. Hold off."

Grudgingly, the Chief let me go on. "As I was saying," I recommenced once Fozzie had dutifully returned to his seat, "Fozzie had become suspicious of Sam. He told me that there were two new singers, Wayne and Wanda, in the cast of performers at Uncle Henson's Theater, and that while he and his other compatriots were being paid less and less, Wayne and Wanda continually received more money." I paused for emphasis. "The reason behind this was that every week, Sam sent money to charities. For him, money had grown rather tight since Wayne and Wanda had started performing, so he had been sneakily deducting cash from the paychecks of his employees to pay for these soul-felt acts. Wayne and Wanda only _looked_ to the bear like they were being paid more and more, as they were the only employees whose salaries _hadn't_ been slashed. They were actually still at a level rate of pay."

"That's it, then!" the Chief shouted, pointing a triumphant finger at the shaking singing couple. "Wayne and Wanda, you—"

"—are going to stay right where they are," I finished with a glare at the Chief. I could hear Wayne and Wanda sigh audibly. "They are innocent. Everyone here is innocent until they're proven guilty. And that hasn't happened yet."

Growling, Chief Sweetums settled back and crossed his arms, muttering a few things that would probably offend a few more pious guests. "But neither I nor the bear knew this at the time," I continued, taking up the pacing again, "and he left with the promise that I'd investigate into Sam. Then, as we all know, that same night Sam was murdered."

I took another pause to survey the audience. Some were fidgeting, uncomfortable; others seemed unaffected. A trickle of sweat was dribbling down Dr. Strangepork's temple, but I knew the cause of that already. "Let me digress and tell the story from another's point of view," I began, then with a sharp glance at the Chief went on, "who shall remain nameless. This witness had been in their dressing room at the Theater all night, and Sam had been staying late in his office. Out in the hallway for personal reasons, this witness viewed the bandmembers of the Theater—Sergeant Floyd Pepper, Zoot, Janice, Dr. Teeth and Animal—exit _their_ dressing room."

"Ho-hold on!" This time it was Wayne, who stood hesitantly. Wanda looked like she was trying her best to get him to sit down again, but he, though worried, kept with his thought. "_Floyd_ Pepper," he started slowly, "...and _Phyllis_ Pepper?"

The murmurs started again, but I stopped them once more by raising my voice above the crowd. "I hardly think," I shouted, "that family ties have anything to do with this!"

"You're _related?_" the Chief cried out, furious. "That's _bias!_ You shouldn't be allowed to present this case if it involves your own family!"

"For your information, I am not biased in this case," I informed him icily. "I am treating every suspect and every witness as if I had never seen them before in my life. As for my final evidence, well, that's up to yourself and the judges as to whether it would hold up in court." Leaving him dumbstruck for the moment, I went on, "The bandmembers had been heading towards the office of Sam the Eagle when the witness saw them, but contrary to what may be thought they did _not_ enter the office."

"A gun, perhaps?" suggested Uncle Deadly rather morbidly, raising a draconically scaled hand.

"For one thing," I replied calmly, looking right at Uncle Deadly where he sat, "the bandmembers didn't murder Sam the Eagle. For another, Sam wasn't attacked with a gun of any sort."

"How does _vous_ know all of this?" Miss Piggy demanded, rising from her seat with a clatter. Pointing accusingly towards Floyd, she charged, "_Vous_ already said that you were related to him, so ya' might be covering up for them! And how do you _know_ that he wasn't killed with a gun?"

"All in due time, Miss Piggy," I answered. Stroking my chin, I also added, "And if you're still worried about your dog Foo-Foo, I'll tell you now that he is safe and sound in your dressing room back at the Theater."

She was struck speechless at this unexpected statement, so I had a chance to continue. "The reason that the bandmembers weren't restored to their dressing rooms after the murder was because they were in a location that the police wouldn't have been able to find them. They, unlike the other performers, didn't have a room upstairs of the Theater. Whereas the other performers _did_, so that was why the _rest_ of the were found. All save Fozzie, of course. And when Hilda saw the body and screamed, all of the performers except the bandmembers and the witness were in their rooms upstairs—the witness hurried to their room, and the bandmembers had already gone for a walk outside. Fozzie had just gotten back from a meeting with Sam, so he was just lighting a few candles to read by when he was found in his room by the police."

"Then it _was_ the bear, as I told you all along!" the Chief insisted triumphantly, but as I shook my head again his face contorted into a snarl.

"Fozzie left the room long before Sam was attacked," I explained. "He left the office even before the bandmembers headed towards it. He had just had a large spot of trouble lighting the matches, so he went through a few packets before he got a candle going steadily." I pulled a sealed plastic bag out of the pocket of my trenchcoat, which contained around thirty spent matches along with a few scraps of tissue and other small pieces of garbage. "I found these in the wastebasket in Fozzie's room just now," I explained, tossing the bag to Dr. Honeydew, who caught it rather surprisedly. "I wore gloves when I picked them up, so if you'll permit your forensics to examine them I believe you'll find that Fozzie's pawprints are all over them, and they date to having been struck from a minute or so _before_ the murder to a minute or so _after_ the murder."

There was a silence as Dr. Honeydew sniffed the matches curiously before taking out a small black box-shaped device that he handed to Beaker. The Doctor opened a hatch on the box, pulled out five matches at random from the package and threw them into the box, pulling a switch. The box crackled and fizzed with electricity as Beaker vibrated painfully from the thousand or so volts being forced through his body. After a minute or so the box _ding_ed, and after examining it Dr. Honeydew called, "Ms. Pepper is correct, Chief!"

As the Chief gnashed his fangs, I heard Fozzie sigh with relief. I didn't blame him; I'd had to look hard to find that perfect evidence in Foz's room, and I knew that if I had been the one almost on death row I'd be feeling pretty thankful too. "As for the Theater," I went on, "the walls on the outside are smooth and unscalable, and there's no room for any sort of ladder. The murderer couldn't have gone to an upstairs room that way, because whoever it was entered _and_ exited through an open window in Sam's office."

"Couldn't they have used a cannon?" Gonzo asked, raising his hand. Miss Piggy gave him a smart karate-chop across the chest.

"No, because the noise would have been heard," I continued, pacing again. "But though Sam's office hadn't been locked, the murderer _did_ use the window. And it was a very big, or at least very _strong_ murderer, because they had somehow managed to accidentally tip a file cabinet over and reposition it at some point before or after the murder. The lights had also been dimmed by the murderer after the deed had been done so that no one would see or recognize them when they reexited through the window."

I took a break in the conversation again, watching them sweat. Strangepork's eyes were darting from side to side, and Miss Piggy looked like she was biting her lip to avoid saying something nasty. The rats were all huddled in a small group together. Rowlf was listening interestedly, but a little scared. I thought for a minute whether I should mention Camilla's deceit or not in trying to do a frame-up, but as I glanced up at her and Gonzo in their seats, Gonzo with his arm around her, I decided against it. No need to trouble them further.

"But enough of that for now," I announced suddenly, pausing and standing still again. "There's another few things that I want to address in the same breath as all this." I caught Robin's eye, and he knew what I was talking about. But I decided to start somewhere else instead. "For starters," I began once more, turning to the Muppet Labs table, "I was at the El Sleezo this afternoon, Dr. Honeydew, on account of that receipt I showed you before."

"What receipt?" demanded the Chief, but Dr. Honeydew spared me the trouble of explaining it.

"Ms. Pepper and one of her associates brought me a receipt that they had discovered," the Doctor told him, turning in his seat and looking up at the imposing figure of Chief Sweetums through his glasses. "It listed a Muppet Labs item as being sold at a storefront called 'El Sleezo' for a large amount of money." He turned back to me. "What did you determine, Ms. Pepper?"

I prolonged the moment just a little, taking my time in answering. "Did you know, Dr. Honeydew," I finally came out, "that Dr. Strangepork has started with his intern nephew a small branch of Muppet Labs that deals in making items exclusively for the black market?"

Dr. Strangepork brought his fist crashing down on the table and stood indignantly. "That's a _lie!_" he protested as Dr. Honeydew and Beaker looked on in alarm.

"Oh, _is_ it?" I replied caustically, and facing the room Fozzie had exited, I called out, "Hey, would you come out here, Cap'n?"

A young adult pig with humanlike eyes and a strong chin came into the main room, brushing down his yellow-blonde crewcut over his ears. He was wearing casual clothes, unlike the Trekkie uniform of Strangepork. "May I present Link Hogthrob, Commanding Captain of the black market enterprise of Muppet Labs," I declared, and both Link and I bowed. Dr. Strangepork was dumbstruck. "He told me everything after I complimented him on his looks."

"Link!" Strangepork protested. "How _could_ you?"

Hogthrob shrugged. "Just like she said," he explained, then began to preen himself. "Is it _true_ that I cut a magnificent figure?"

Dr. Strangepork started moaning, but Dr. Honeydew was incredulously outraged. "Julius," he bemoaned, "the question is how could _you?_" In his stunned disbelief, the Doctor kept up his accusations. "All Muppet Labs has ever _stood_ for was honesty and goodness and—" Beaker sarcastically set off a string of sounds, which Dr. Honeydew obliviously included into his speech. "—and _blowing things up!_"

"You may deal with Strangepork later, Dr. Honeydew," I broke in, and sent Link to the seat next to his nervous, defeated uncle. "There's still a few more things that I would like to clear up."

"How about the murder?" Scooter offered.

"Yorn du sverrin, a desh de yorn de _who_ skidoo?" asked the Theater's chef in the same instant.

"I'm getting to that," I assured them, then in the same breath I whirled around and spoke to Kermit. "Kermit! Offhand, would you say that your editor at _The Muppetburg Times_, Lew Zealand, was sitting in the audience at this very moment?"

Kermit seemed confused. "Phyllis, what does that—" he started, but by my expression he realized that this was no time for him to ask for particulars and he instead glanced around the room. "No, I don't see him."

"Ah, but you're wrong," I insisted, and Kermit's face contorted in bewilderment. "Perhaps not the _real_ Lew Zealand," I elaborated, "but the one _you've_ known for six months."

"What are you _getting_ at, Pepper?" Chief Sweetums growled menacingly. He'd taken out his club now, and he began to punch it lightly into his own hand with the implication that I'd better explain or that would be my face at the end of his club instead.

"What I'm getting at," I answered coolly, "is _this_. LEW!"

Three fish whipped into the room at about head level for most Muppets, whirling around in the air before returning to the hand of Lew Zealand, who had also exited from the side room. "I throw the fish in the air...they sail away...and then they come back to me!" he giggled, and Kermit stood up immediately.

"Mr. Zealand!" he cried out in surprise.

"Exactly," I responded as Lew waved to Kermit, and I scanned the audience again. I focused on one particular table, and my words were directed at them as they shivered under my gaze. "Six months ago, Lew Zealand, the editor of _The Muppetburg Times_, spontaneously decided that he was tired of having a desk job, so he took a lunch break and never came back. He then took a job serving at Doc Hopper's Frog Legs at the edge of town. However, there were six tenants in Lew Zealand's office that he had never known about: a clan of dancing rats."

The rats shrunk back from me. "The rats saw an opportunity here to make some money," I continued. "One of them, an excellent forger, copied Mr. Zealand's signature on any papers or checks that needed a signature. Another one, good at doing impressions, imitated Mr. Zealand's voice on the phone. Of course, 'Lew Zealand' was never able to leave his office, so the rats used the story that Zealand had hired them to act as messengers. But they didn't study Zealand's _character_ well enough to totally pull it off." I paused again, glancing at Rizzo. "And Rizzo the Rat, here, was _also_ making a pretty penny off of this, seeing as he was second cousin of one of the office rats and uncle on the mother's side to two of the others. Only a rat who has had _very much_ to eat every day for several months would be unable to distinguish between old refried beans and _jellybeans_."

"You _had_ to do it, Rizzo!" accused one of the rats, a girl with blonde hair, but another clapped his hand over her mouth.

"We don't know what you're talking about," he protested, shooting a look at his companions. "We only _work_ for Mr. Zealand, or whoever was pretending to be him."

"Yeah," went on another rat in _Lew Zealand's_ voice, "we—" In realization of who he'd been emulating, he slapped himself upside the head. "We're sunk," he complained, still using the voice of the former editor.

"And that's not _all_," I went on implicatively, pacing before the rats' table as they cowered. "The evening of the murder of Sam the Eagle, the 'editor' of _The Muppetburg Times_ called Kermit, one of the reporters, at the Theater and told him to make sure he had a story for the following day."

Without my prompting, Rowlf stood up. "_They_ must have known about the murder!" he proclaimed. "Oh boy, this sounds like one of those Sherlock Holmes books!"

The rats were almost under the table by now, and I sunk them a few more inches as I drew closer. "Yes, the rats _did_ know that the murder would occur. They became aware of the murderer's actions, and with the promise of money and the first scoop in town they were..._persuaded_ to keep the identity of the _true_ killer silent."

"Who _was_ the murderer?" Uncle Deadly objected, licking his lips impatiently.

I nodded to him. "Yes, the murderer. That's where I was headed next." I heaved in a breath. "For this, let us review the facts in point," I began, pacing and ticking them off on my fingers. "First, Fozzie could not have possibly been the murderer because _he _was trying to light matches in his room during that entire stretch of time. Second, the bandmembers went for a walk and returned to their _own_ home, and all of the other performers in the Theater were upstairs in their rooms or at least _heading_ for their rooms, as was the case of the witness. Third, Wayne and Wanda were _not_ gaining special attention from Sam for any reason besides that they were his favorite performers. Fourth, Hilda and the chef were both in the kitchen cleaning up until Hilda had to ask Sam something and found his body. Fifth, the murderer _could not_ have been eligible to enter the Theater after hours, because the murderer was forced to enter _and leave_ through an open window in Sam's office. Sixth, the murderer had at least either the mass or the strength to tip over a heavy, full filing cabinet." I stopped there and waited.

"Well, Phyllis?" Fozzie cried, scared out of his wits. He was shaking badly; he apparently couldn't take it anymore. "Who was it?"

I held up a finger to quiet him. "To conclude this story," I stated, "I went back to my office just before I called everyone here. Someone was waiting for me inside, and this someone gave me the last piece of information I needed to find it out." Walking over to the door to the kitchen of Movin' Right Along, I pulled it open with a yank and let the occupant walk out—at first to shocked silence, but then Zoot stood up slowly, trembling and pointing.

"Dude," he choked, "it's the' EAGLE!"

He was absolutely right, because standing right there in the middle of the room now was Sam the Eagle—his feathers perhaps more ruffled, maybe with a slightly more confused air than usual, but it was without a doubt Sam. "That's right," I proclaimed over the dead silence. "Sam met me in my office, half without his memory but very much alive." As I whirled around again my trenchcoat whipped loosely around like a flag. "Miss Piggy," I addressed the porcine diva, "you asked me how I knew the murder weapon wasn't a gun. Well, it was a blunt instrument, because the eagle was struck on the back of the head, knocking him simply_ unconscious!_ The murderer, seeing Sam slumped on the floor, thought that he had done his job and left. When Hilda saw Sam, she _did_ check for breathing but didn't listen well enough to hear the weak sound. The body disappeared because before the police even arrived, Sam recovered from the blow and, having a severe concussion and a sprinkling of amnesia, wandered haphazardly out the open window. He tipped over a potted plant on his desk as he stumbled out; that's where I knew that _two_ people had left the room after the deed was committed, because for the first part it had been knocked off the desk by someone _much smaller_ and more lightweight than the file-cabinet-tipper, and for the second part, if Sam had been _anywhere_ within himself, he would not allow a _single_ plant to be out of line."

"Absolutely correct," the Eagle muttered, though still a bit wobbling and confused.

"For the past few days," I kept on, narrating exactly what Sam had said in my office that short time ago, "he's been entering random places trying to figure out who he was and getting nowhere—but today just a little bit of his memory returned and, seeing my office in the yellow pages, decided to ask for my services in finding out what had happened to make him lose whatever occupation he had thought he had previously practiced. He remembered his name, the name of Uncle Henson's Theater and Wayne and Wanda, as well as some very _crucial_ other details—lucky chance that he picked me for his investigation, because now I know _exactly_ who it was that _almost_ killed him!"

"Don't keep us in suspense, man!" Floyd protested, standing up. "Who did it?"

I paced a little more and waited for Floyd to sit down before I continued again. "Earlier, I said that Sam had been contributing to charity," I said, "but I intentionally left out _which_ charity." Turning to the eagle, who had been standing awkwardly next to me, I asked, "Sam, do you remember the name of the charity to which you have been giving so _generously_ over the past month?"

"Of course!" Sam replied, mildly offended. Smoothing down the sparse feathers about the sides of his head, he recited, "For almost _exactly_ a month, I have been donating as much money as could be spared to the charity D.U.N.G.—'**D**edicated to **U**nfortunate **N**on-Muppets' **G**ood-fellowship!"

I turned back to my watchers. "There you have it," I announced, waiting a little longer so I could prolong the suffering. "Sam contributed to a charity that supported, as stated so generously in the title, those who were _not_ Muppets—also known to the common character as _humans_. And I know for a fact that the blunt instrument used to give Mr. Eagle a blow to the head was a _police-issue club_." My voice rising with every word, I announced, "THE MURDERER WAS NONE OTHER THAN THE CHIEF OF POLICE, CHIEF SWEETUMS!"

I heard a growl from directly behind me, and realized with horror who had just managed to sneak around behind me. "You may know that," the Chief cried out, lifting his club into the air over my head, "_but I'll make sure that you'll never know anything again!_"


	25. Chapter 25

**Chapter 25**: The Aftermath

"PHYLLIS, LOOK OUT!"

That cry came from over a dozen throats at once, all in some sort of different form but still the exact same warning. But I couldn't do anything. The Chief's club was crashing down closer to my skull, and even though it felt like everything was moving in slow motion I had no way to get myself to move out of the line of fire.

Then, all of a sudden, I felt my legs give out from under me as I was tackled out of the way of the coming club. I skidded to a halt on the floor, and in a panic looked around to see who it was that had pushed me out of the crossfire. In astonishment I realized that lying panting on the floor was Kermit, with Robin by his side.

Before I had a chance to dwell on that fact, I remembered with a jolt the Chief and looked up, expecting to see his club preparing to finish smashing me into a pulp. Instead, though, he was swinging pointlessly at—at—

Hanging off the Chief's right leg and trying to bite him was Rowlf, helped out by Baskerville and Animal. Beauregard, Fozzie, Zoot, Gonzo and Scooter were hanging onto his left arm, restraining his club. Miss Piggy was attacking him with all the force of a pig enraged, and Lew Zealand was throwing his boomerang fish with wild abandon. Wayne, Wanda, Janice, Dr. Teeth, Dr. Honeydew, Uncle Deadly and Beaker were also fighting back in any way they could figure.

And right there, in the middle of the fray, was Floyd, fending off the Chief with a blazing fervor that I had never seen him use before in my life.

I was utterly taken aback. Instead of being crushed beneath the club of an almost-murderer, I was instead being _rescued_ by—well, just about everyone I'd met over the course of this adventure. Many of the people who were now risking their lives to save me I had only known for a few days of _my_ life.

"_Even if you tie us up, we'll follow you. Because if you're going to risk your life, then we want the chance to possibly save it. No matter what."_

Kermit had said that two days ago when I had tried to dissuade him and Fozzie from following me to the sewer community. And he had been _better_ than his word...even better than I had thought _anyone_ could ever be. Maybe when I had moved to Muppetburg...maybe, instead of just earning a new lifestyle, I had earned the best friends I could possibly ask for, no matter how long I lived.

I stood up, groaning a bit at the ache to my bones from landing on the floor. I staggered a bit, but Kermit supported me with his shoulder. "That's enough, Chief," I announced. "We know what you tried to do."

Though Chief Sweetums still continued to fight, the five on his left arm eventually wrestled his club away from him while Miss Piggy karate-chopped him into submission. After only about a minute of heavy struggling, Crazy Harry managed to secure handcuffs on him with the help of several other cops. The Swedish chef was holding the Chief at the point of his musket, as none of the other policemen really had any weapons with them. "You'll be lucky if you get _life_ for this," Baskerville yapped.

"That's right, ex-Chief," I declared as I stumbled over to him, forsaking Kermit's assistance this time. "You have to stand trial like the _others_ in this room that have done wrong."

"Hey, Ms. Pepper!" Beauregard called, and I turned as quickly as I could manage. He was pointing to the seats that Rizzo and his partners in crime had occupied. They were all empty. "The rats escaped!"

I looked over, and saw a small hole in between the hardwood slats that seemed like it had been dug in a frenzy with no time to spare. I sighed. "They burrowed out while we were all occupied with stopping the Chief. No use looking for them; they could come up _anywhere_." I turned to Beauregard. "You might want to deal with Dr. Strangepork first, though," I mentioned. "He seems like he might not feel so bad serving his proper term and getting it over with."

"OK," Beau replied, then paused for a second. "Why are you asking _me_ to do all this stuff?"

I inclined my head at the Chief, who was still being restrained—though Uncle Deadly was looking over him with a rather morbid interest. "He's not the Chief of Police anymore," I smiled. "And I think in the chain of command, _you're_ next up for the office."

The revelation hit him with the force of one of Lew Zealand's boomerang fish. I let him just stand there in quiet surprise for a second, before I finished completely with the story I had to tell. "But the Chief was not alone in planning for Sam the Eagle's murder!" I called out, and at those words everyone hushed again.

———

**WALDORF**: Oh, they CAN'T keep us LONGER!!

———

"There was another involved," I announced. "In fact, _two_ others." Advancing towards those still-seated, I pointed directly at the two hecklers. "THEM!"

———

**STATLER**: WHAT?!

———

"Yes!" I proclaimed as several more cops came around and cuffed them in irons. "The Chief's racism helped make him the perfect dupe for the job, especially considering the fact that _no one_ would suspect a member of the _police force!_ These two old hecklers had never liked the acts at the Theater, so they realized that if they were somehow able to kill Sam, the _rest_ of the acts would drop off one by one! _They_ were the ones the Chief called when I spotted him _out of uniform_ the afternoon before the 'murder', getting instructions on the deed under the coded pretense that he was calling his mother!" I kept at it, though they were shrinking away in the realization that they were trapped. "The rats were _their_ dupes, not the Chief's. And they were following along with a detailed report of my investigation, written by a series of Muppets who had been trailing me, so they'd know when I had gotten dangerously close to discovering _their_ hand in the whole thing! That's why Rizzo was so _conveniently_ at Shoeshine Scooter's at the same time _I_ was!"

———

**STATLER**: NOOO!

**WALDORF**: How could she have CAUGHT us? It was the PERFECT crime!

**STATLER**: Well, EXCEPT for the fact that SHE JUST CAUGHT US!

**WALDORF**: Oh, shut up!

**STATLER**: YOU shut up!

**WALDORF**: YOU should have known BETTER than to chain us to our seats in the Theater!

**STATLER**: Well, YOU should have known better than to TELL me to chain us to our seats!

**WALDORF**: WELL—

———

The two hecklers kept arguing the whole way through, but I didn't hear them. Off by the doors out of Movin' Right Along I spotted Floyd, waving to try and get my attention. Making sure that Beauregard had just about everything under control, I headed over to my cousin and we walked outside.

It was early in the night, but the sky was already dark and speckled with stars. Most of the storefronts in the area had already turned on their outdoor lightbulbs, and the whole thing had a sort of a mystical aura about it. Floyd and I walked in silence over to a bench just outside the little diner, just under a streetlamp. The light gave Floyd's hair a fluorescent sort of sheen.

We sat for a while, not talking, not looking at each other. The cacophony from inside Movin' Right Along seemed like it came from a different world altogether. After a moment or so, however, Floyd spoke. "You busted the doctor and the rats, but you didn't say nothin' about me and the rest of the guys."

I took my time to answer. "No, I didn't." I didn't look at him, instead slumping over almost double and letting all my attention be occupied by a pool of the light spilling onto the sidewalk from the lamppost.

"Why?" Floyd asked it so softly, his mouth hardly moving, that at first I didn't think that I'd heard him say it at all. The question, so simple, was yet so important.

I finally got myself up enough that I actually looked up at his face. The dark sunglasses may have masked his eyes, but the same question was reflected in their lenses. "Why else?" I offered, trying to smile but only managing it weakly. "You're my cousin."

Even though it was causing him some doubt and pain, Floyd persisted. "You said _yourself_ to the chief o' the fuzz that that had nothin' to do with your decision!" he protested. "Is that really it? I'll turn myself in if you want, cus, that's all I'm askin'!"

I heaved a sigh, looking off into the distance. "I owed you one, Floyd," I stated, and he glanced at me in confusion. I looked back at him again. "Two days ago, you were in your room at The Happiness Hotel, and you were confused that the receipt was missing for the Overrider. Well, it was missing because I had taken it just a few seconds before you guys came back." While Floyd continued to stare in incredulity, I grinned and continued, "I didn't think that you'd return while I was in the room, so I hid. That was why Animal was yelling 'Woman', 'cus he had sniffed me out already. But you didn't believe him, and made him stop yelling, and because of that you never knew that I'd been there. I owed you for not finding me out so that, among several other reasons, was why I didn't say anything."

We sat in silence for another short while, then Floyd started laughing. "You're too funny, Phyll!" he snickered. "Breakin' into my room when I was out, then thinkin' you _owe_ me for not catchin' you..." He just shook his head, still convulsing in laughter. "Man, if Animal hadn't been with us, I wouldn't have _ever_ thought that you could've done it! Whatever happened to that little kid who always had to be occupied by her cousin Floyd at all the family reunions?"

"I think she grew up," I responded, leaning against his shoulder just a little. After a pause, I added, "Did you know that your drummer was a prison escapee?"

The arbitrary fact certainly jolted Floyd up. "_What?_"

I grinned at him. "I'm serious! Before he met up with your band, Animal was incarcerated at a maximum-security branch of the Muppetburg police station, and he broke out only a little while back by attacking the guard who brought him lunch. I found it out when I looked up any records you and the rest of the Mayhem might have had at the police station."

Floyd just shook his head again amidst chuckles, and aside from that all was once more silent except for the din coming out of the diner. Then, a little quietly, I mumbled, "You were right."

He looked at me. "Right 'bout what, cus?"

I sighed, and my face colored up again. "About Kermit," I confessed, "and how I...you know, how much I liked him." It took some effort to admit to all this, especially to Floyd. "I really _did_ like him like that, but he loves somebody else. Miss Piggy." Floyd was about to say something, but I cut him off. "I'm OK now, though. I've accepted it, and it's not going to get the better of me. Besides, I'd probably never have been comfortable as anything other than a friend, even after all that time we spent together."

I let the conversation lie there, and even though it felt kind of weird sharing such personal stuff like this with Floyd, I felt a lot better finally getting it all out. But it was a surprise to me when I felt Floyd's hand atop mine. "Phyll...sorry."

I smiled as well as I could, too embarrassed to look at him now. "It's really better now, though," I breathed, "because I have a _lot_ of friends now. And they're all even gutsy enough to take on an _ogre!_"

"Only," Floyd reminded, grinning, "if you're in danger for it."

We might have sat there together for a few minutes, maybe a few hours, maybe even the whole night. But at last everything was just as it should be: I maybe hadn't found true love yet, but I had found a lot of friends and rediscovered a spiritually-lost cousin. And all in the middle of looking for a murderer.

Only in Muppetburg.


	26. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

The Chief was put on trial a week later for the attempted murder of Sam the Eagle, and he was convicted and sent to jail for a fifty-year term, though with hopes of parole. Dr. Strangepork was also put on trial, but his sentence was fairly light because he admitted freely to all the charges and only asked that he be able to watch his favorite TV show, _Pigs In Space_, while he was incarcerated...they're looking into it. The trial of the two old guys from the Theater came after that, but they got out on bail and it's yet to see what'll happen to them.

Speaking of the Theater, the recovery of Sam and the identity of his would-be killer made headlines in _The Muppetburg Times_ for days, which was the most publicity that Uncle Henson's Theater had ever gotten. A few miles away in a human city, some hack named Jim Henson—the adopted human nephew of the "Uncle Henson" who owned the theater—found out about it, and together with the son of some guy named _Mike Oznowicz_, Frank, turned all of the unnoticed little sideshow acts in the nightclub into huge TV stars. Talk about _coincidence_. They even rooted out the underground illegal community of musicians and gave _them_ jobs on the new TV show being broadcast coast-to-coast in both human _and_ Muppet cities. Muppet Labs, even, was granted sponsorship rights in exchange for commercials for their products appearing during the show, as presented by _none other_ than Dr. Honeydew and his assistant Beaker—who finally had the chance to give Fozzie the self-destruct necktie that he'd been pining for. Sam, having had time to look back on his life after his experience with being almost killed, abdicated from the position of head honcho of the group and let Kermit take over instead. So Kermit was finally able to do what he did best: deal with both music and Miss Piggy all day long. Sure, she got in his way and irritated him all day on the set, but he liked it. Fozzie, his name cleared, became a well-known comedian too, and even The Electric Mayhem were able to arrange it so that they were able to be the pit orchestra _and_ perform their own original material on the show. The only minor problem was that Dr. Teeth _still_ refused to play in the pit orchestra, but that was solved and Rowlf was hired, managing in one of the comedic sketches the role of Sherlock Holmes which he had wanted for so long.

As for Sam, well, he still stayed on the show sometimes, but mostly he was involved writing the "Culture" section of _The Muppetburg Times_. Since the rats had gotten away and the _real_ Lew Zealand refused to leave Doc Hopper's, Alice was promoted to the position of editor. As I understand it, the paper has been _pretty interesting_ since she took over...

As for me, well, I made sure that I was written out of any non-official reports about any of the cases. The publicity for being the one who found the murderer would have been great, but really, I preferred the lost cats to these big-scale undertakings anyways. Somehow or other, though, word has gotten out to at least a select few human newspapers, so after a little while maybe I _won't_ be the only human in Muppetburg. Well, I've kind of _enjoyed_ the post though...but that's all in the future.

After a successful day's filming on the TV set the first week, Kermit came home and plunked an envelope on the table in front of me. We'd moved to the upstairs apartment like Uncle Deadly had wanted us to while the downstairs room was renovated. City Hall had caved in to his demands after only a few hours in court. Looking at the envelope that Kermit had given me, I asked, "Well, what is it?"

"The first week's pay," he announced proudly. "Open it up and see."

I did, and when I saw the number on the check I felt like I was in an octopus's garden or at least somewhere else entirely. "That _much?_" I cried out. "That's _great_, Kermit!"

"Now _you_ won't have to do so much work," Kermit proclaimed, seating himself down again. "With _that_ much money a week, paying the rent won't even be on our list of priorities!"

"No way, Kermit," I insisted, feeling déjà vu set in again. "I'm going to let my meager contribution make its way into the income. I can't let you _overshadow_ me."

I had been kidding around mostly, but Kermit sobered up at that. "If you were really worried about the money," he explained, the role of analytical deduction delegated to him for this once, "you would have let the papers say something about how _you_ solved all those mysteries. Then you could've become a big-shot detective. Or you could've at _least_ come down to be on the show or something?"

I laughed. "No thanks, Kermit. I don't like being on either side of a camera, but I'm happy enough volunteering to be the laugh track. And as for hitting the big time as a detective, well, I like a quiet life. Simple."

As if waiting for that particular cue, somebody knocked on the door. And not a normal knock, either: it was the "shave-and-a-haircut". _KNOCK knock knock KNOCK knock—knock KNOCK!_ Puzzled, Kermit got up and walked over to the door, turned the knob and opened it.

"Wocka wocka!" Fozzie called cheerfully, literally jumping into the room. He moved so quickly that he knocked Kermit off his feet, and while the amphibian was pulling himself off the floor _I_ was staring at Foz. He was carrying a _suitcase_.

"Oh, hi, Fozzie," I started apprehensively. "What brings you here?"

He grinned and started whirling around. "Just the _happiest_, most _endearing_ idea that you've _ever_ heard!" the bear cried out, then paused for what he probably thought was a suspenseful moment. "I'm moving in with you!"

The thought nearly knocked all the respirational functions out of my mind as I looked at Kermit in horror. "Uh, why would you have to do _that_, Fozzie?" Kermit asked, heaving himself off the floor just in time for Fozzie to accidentally drop his suitcase on him. "I thought," the frog wheezed from the weight of several pounds of personal effects blocking his breathing passage, "that you had enough money to pay back your mom _and_ get your own place."

"Ah ah ah, _corrrrrrection_, froggy!" Fozzie lilted, his silly grin plastered all over his face. He was dancing out of the kitchen now, inspecting the TV set and the general livability of the living room. "I've got enough to pay Mom, but don't you remember how I knocked over that camera?" The sound of his mishap almost sounded like it filled him with severe glee. "If I keep having those sorts of accidents, I _won't_ be able to have my own apartment! So I guess I'm just going to _have_ to stay with you, and maybe I'll _even_ have to help Phyllis with her detective work!"

While Fozzie continued admiring the rest of my apartment, Kermit was able to shove the suitcase off of his abdomen and stand up. Wandering over to me and watching the bear, he commented, "What was it you were saying about a quiet, simple life?"

"Whatever it was, _forget_ it."

Anybody got a lost cat?

———

**WALDORF**: So, we got BUSTED.

**STATLER**: And you got bored to tears.

**WALDORF**: We hope.

**STATLER**: Well anyways, that's what you get for picking this up in the first place!

**WALDORF**: That in ITSELF is a crime!

**STATLER** **AND** **WALDORF**: Heh heh heh heh...oh, forget it.

**:Message Truncated:**


	27. Special Features

**Special Features**

As we have learned from the _Lord of the Rings_ trilogy, all really long and really complicated stories need really long and really complicated special features, including, and not limited to, a complete and (sort of) comprehensive guide to all of the in-jokes.

_A COMPLETE AND (SORT OF) COMPREHENSIVE GUIDE TO ALL OF THE IN-JOKES , IN CASE SOMEONE ACTUALLY CARES..._

_**CHAPTER 1**_

-Mickey Moose and Ronald Duck I saw on one of the "compilation best-of" Muppets videos so I don't know what episode it was, but they were, as can be seen by their names, pointedly making fun of Mickey and Don.

-"feeling taller by being around Muppets" is from the Paul Williams episode (ep. 8) where Williams states that for the first time in his life, _he_ is the tallest person present...immediately followed by a bunch of huge Muppets coming up behind him.

-Uncle Deadly being a landlord...well, he's already "the phantom of _The Muppet Show_", haunting the theater, so "landlord" isn't too far off.

-Mike Oznowicz is the name of Frank Oz's father.

-"Goelz" is a reference to Dave Goelz, the puppeteer behind Gonzo and Zoot among many others. He's also the only member of the more famous original Muppeteers (Jim Henson, Frank Oz, Richard Hunt, Jerry Nelson and Goelz) who's still Muppeteering today.

-the whole paragraph where Phyllis "explains" Fozzie's problem is a reference to a scene in _The Great Muppet Caper_ where a guy walks up to Kermit and does the exact same thing: gives him the "story of his problem" and launches into an entirely inaccurate yarn—instead of explaining how Kermit thought that Miss Piggy was Lady Holiday and that she left behind her glass slipper like Cinderella, he goes on this whole _huge_ explanation of how he had this _traumatic_ life running a laundromat until he finally took his last savings and sunk it in the glass slipper business. (Actually, that's where the part about "the detergent lady at the laundromat" came from in mine...)

-"Mahna Mahna", in case you somehow don't know, is the famous Muppet routine with the little guy that just says "Mahna Mahna" throughout the whole song. It's maybe the _most_ famous Muppet routine, as it has been performed numerous times on _The Ed Sullivan Show_ and other places...and I think now it's a Dr. Pepper commercial.

-"Uncle Henson's Theater"; well, the Jim Henson reference is obvious there, but the "Uncle" part is a reference to Scooter's uncle owning the theater in _The Muppet Show_—a fact that Scooter brought up _quite_ often.

-Irving Bizarre showed up at least in episode 22 of Season One of _The Muppet Show_ as Fozzie's agent...he was a weird little guy who was really just a top hat with feet, and spent the whole episode trying to negotiate Fozzie's contract. He ended up getting Kermit to pay Fozzie around ten times what Foz was currently getting, but then they realize exactly _how much_ ten times _zero_ is.

-I'm not certain if everyone recognizes them, but Wayne and Wanda were the singing couple from Season One who could never get past the first few lines of a song without something going wrong...case in point is the famous "Trees" number, featured in Chapter 3.

-yes, everyone Fozzie listed really _was_ successful in each of those fields, _and_ reunions for _The Brady Bunch_ probably number higher than the rate of commerce for the US.

-George the Janitor was in _The Muppet Show_ Season One, but was retired after that and replaced by Beauregard. He was performed by Frank Oz.

-the "Bravo! Encore!—Oh no, they heard us!" joke is a variation on a couple of lines Stat and Waldorf used at the end of one of _The Muppet Show_ episodes from Season One, as well as a between-sketch transition in the Ethel Merman episode (ep. 22) and in the Kaye Ballard episode (ep. 23).

_**CHAPTER 2**_

-"Movin' Right Along"...well it's kind of pointless if I have to define _this_ one, but I'm putting in _all_ the in-jokes...it's that song from _The Muppet Movie_, that everyone knows because it was a song on a sing-along tape that anyone young enough at that time probably saw a million times before they refused to admit they ever watched it. I, for one, will readily admit that I remember the words to almost _every_ song on that tape, but only because _I_, unlike the rest of us, had the guts (and also the bored mind) to take it out of those hidden vestiges of the closet to watch it once more.

-"Eight Little Notes" was a song that Rowlf played at some point during _The Muppet Show_, and was also on that same sing-along tape I just finished rambling about.

-the line about each striking of the keys jolting Rowlf more than "the tornado shook up Dorothy" was a direct reference to _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_, which I hadn't seen when I'd written this part. (It was actually not so bad a movie, really...better than I'd expected, and Ashanti actually _was_ an OK actress...but it was _way_ too commercialized, the opening number I considered completely pointless, it was more "racy" than the finest of the Muppets movies, and some of the parts were simply _overdone_. All right, I'm FINISHED! You know, you could've skipped this last part, or even this entire section...aw, too late now.)

-the "triple-cream sodas" and the "I don't drink with strangers" bit was taken from a sketch Rowlf did in the Phyllis Diller (whom Phyllis Pepper was named after) episode (ep. 18) of _The Muppet Show_.

-let me just take the time out to say that before Rowlf became Rowlf, two other names considered for him were Wendel and Vanderwoof. This has NOTHING whatsoever to do with anything, but I HAD to say it. If I ever get bored enough that I actually sit down and write a sequel to this story, I'm going to find some way to incorporate that into the plot.

-"You and I and George" from the historic episode 1 of _The Muppet Show_ is pretty much the only song in here that hadn't been cut down to make it shorter...yeah, that's the whole song. And _really_, nobody is credited for writing it because presumably they don't want to have to admit it. Plus, the preamble Rowlf gives is pretty much a condensed version of the intro he gave the piece during the show...in Season One, though he reprised the song for an episode in Season Four.

-"a dog with a sheepish expression" is a modified quote from _Who Censored Roger Rabbit_ by Gary Wolf (the inspiration for the movie _Who Framed Roger Rabbit_, one of my favorites), where Eddie Valiant narrates "Roger showed me what had to be a real oddity, a rabbit wearing a sheepish expression."

-Steve Urkel, you know the pants-up-to-his-neck kid from _All in the Family_ (?).

-"Minuet in G" and "Fur Elise" _were_ actually two pieces that Rowlf played during _The Muppet Show_, specifically in Season One.

-the character I call "Alice" is actually a nameless circumstantial character with the same personality who appeared in several "At the Ballroom" sketches during Season One. Her voice was loud, grating, and one of my favorite of her jokes is when she complains really loudly that she would have been a hit singer, but her albums didn't sell and she didn't understand why. Her dancing partner asks if she sings rock. She shouts, "No..._lullabies_!"

-about the "George Bush" line...I don't keep up with politics, I'm not supporting anyone, I just had to make a funny joke.

-Kermit being a newspaper reporter is from _The Great Muppet Caper_, which was pretty much the whole kick-off to the plot...

-"The Pizza Twins" was the pizza company Kermit and Fozzie pretended to be from when they tried to sneak into The Mallory Gallery during _The Great Muppet Caper_.

-the "albino monk" is Silas from _The Da Vinci Code_, which I have never read (or watched), but a friend of mine refuses to shut up about him.

-after Phyllis crashes into Gonzo, she says "whoever or _whatever_"—I'm hoping that at least someone picked up on _that_ crack...

-"That's OK, I just landed on my head" is from _The Great Muppet Caper_ too—specifically the opening number, "Hey a movie!".

_**CHAPTER 3**_

-"Whatnots" are stock Muppets—their heads look like Scooters, and they pretty much have interchangeable features so one Whatnot could, over the course of the series, portray five or more incidental characters. Scooter himself was a modified Whatnot.

-Ernie, as some may remember who aren't too embarrassed to admit that they watched _Sesame Street_ as _well_ as that sing-along video, was famous for singing the _song_ "Rubber Duckie".

-Jerry Nelson was the performer who did Floyd, Lew Zealand and Statler (among others) until his death.

-"Shoeshine Scooter giving information about important stuff" is a crack at the old TV show _Police Squad_ starring Leslie Nielsen, who paid Johnny the shoeshine boy for info.

-Kermit's outfit when he shows up at Scooter's is the one he wore in (AGAIN!) _The Great Muppet Caper_.

-"Steppin' Out With a Star" was one of the songs in _The Great Muppet Caper_, and I personally consider it one of the _best_ in the movie even though I am insanely in love with _all_ the musical numbers...I have memorized "Happiness Hotel", "Steppin' Out With a Star" and "The First Time It Happens".

-the "Wizard of Oz medley" was a number from a Muppet TV special that I only know of from the aforementioned Muppets sing-along video. I guess it was the spiritual inspiration for _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_, because Gonzo was still The Tin Man and Fozzie was still The Cowardly Lion...but Scooter was originally The Scarecrow (I personally think he fits the character more), Miss Piggy was Dorothy and Foo-Foo was Toto. Oh yeah, and all the Muppets perform their respective songs in that medley better than the "real" actors in the original movie _The Wizard of Oz _(according to me, anyway).

-"Can You Picture That" was the The Electric Mayhem song from _The Muppet Movie_, and it makes a reappearance later in Chapter 13.

-"Vend-a-face" was a very expensive machiney-looking Muppet that removed a Muppet's face and gave them a new one. Apparently the Muppet people had only been planning on using it once, but the upper management said "You paid that much for it, you're going to _use_ it" and it was incorporated into a few more sketches. Statler _did_ actually use "Vend-a-face" once in exactly the circumstances he describes, in the final episode of Season One (ep. 24).

-the "photographer conveniently standing nearby" is about that part in (wait for it...) _The Great Muppet Caper_ where to pay for the meal at the DuBonni club, Gonzo took pictures of the various people and sold them. (Speaking of the DuBonni club, even though John Cleese's cameo in that movie was completely pointless it is one of my favorite parts of that film.)

-yes, I _do_ believe that Wayne looks like Zeppo Marx from the first five Marx Brothers films (you know, the one who sang and got the girl but didn't actually do anything funny).

-and that is _exactly_ what happened when Wayne and Wanda sang "Trees" on _The Muppet Show_.

-"the Gogolala Jubilee Jugband" was the jugband from Season One of _The Muppet Show_ until they were replaced, and they did actually once perform "I'm My Own Grandpa" (which I consider to be an awesome song, whether Muppet-done or not).

-Sam calling the Jugband "not sounding culturally uplifting" was from a line he had on the Ruth Buzzi episode (ep. 4) in Season One.

-"the Amazing Marvin Suggs and his Muppaphone"—Marvin was the crazy guy who hit his fluffy little "Muppaphone" characters over the head to make them emit tonal yelps put together into a song. I will now take the time to insist that this sketch bore an uncanny resemblance to one from _Monty Python's Flying Circus_ in which a man (Terry Jones) does the same thing with a box full of mice. However, may I also point out that _they_ never thought of the finishing gag in which the _man_ ends up getting hit with the giant hammer.

-"Sergeant Floyd Pepper", the namesake for Phyllis's _last_ name, was named after the Beatles album "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Breakfast Bar"—this is also why, as I have suddenly realized, Floyd's dressing room has "Beetles" records all over the door in Chapter 9.

-the whole thing about the band hating the music comes from episode 23 of _The Muppet Show_ where Floyd and the rest try to quit because they hate playing the Muppets' theme music.

-Sam's introduction for Fozzie's act as well as Fozzie's own preface were all borrowed almost word-for-word from the "Good Grief, the Comedian's a Bear" routine from episode 10, Harvey Korman. (The routine's also mentioned in Chapter 10).

-almost all the jokes Fozzie tells at "Uncle Henson's Theater" were made up by me, but the "life after death" one was based on a _Monty Python_ skit—a talk show with three dead people about the existence of an afterlife—and the "eats shoots and leaves" gag is one of the famous ones that is now a title of a book on grammar and punctuation. It may be the only bit of real comedy in Fozzie's whole routine, but it loses something if you don't hear it aloud...

_**CHAPTER 4**_

-"Java" and "Hugga Wugga" were two extraordinarily strange acts from _The Muppet Show_ Season One—"Java" in episode 22 (as well as on _The Ed Sullivan Show_), "Hugga Wugga" in episode 18 (though its precursing sketch was on _The Ed Sullivan Show_ and was called "Skrap Fyap"), and the "piano solo performed solely by chickens" was a routine in a later season.

-all the acts Gonzo references himself as having performed at "The Theater" are true from some point in the TV show...mostly not from Season One, but the "growing a plant to 'The 1812 Overture' " is. (Incidentally, he has also demolished a car with a sledgehammer to "The Anvil Chorus" and eaten a _tire_ to "The Flight of the Bumblebee"—at least, I _think_ I got those two facts right...)

-the dress Miss Piggy wears is the same one she first ever appeared in when her character was introduced on _The Muppet Show_.

-the "silver backdrop" for Miss Piggy's number was sort of born from a cross between the backdrop she had in her "Heat Wave" number on the sing-along tape and Ethel Merman's sparkling, blinding backdrop from when she performed "No Business Like Show Business" in episode 22 of _The Muppet Show_.

-Floyd is _very_ well-known for his intense dislike of Miss Piggy—another reason why he's Phyllis's cousin.

-although fans of the TV series will hate me for Kermit's reciprocal of Miss Piggy's affections, let me just remind you that in every movie _he_ feels the same way about _her_. And even though this story reminds me more of a video game than a movie (you know, how everything is conveniently _there_ and you need a specific item or information to advance?) it still bears more resemblance to the movies than the TV show.

_**CHAPTER 5**_

-"Go to sleep, you're not missing much" is a variation on Statler and Waldorf's ending lines on the recording of the _The Muppet Show_ end theme on the 25th anniversary CD, which was a _re_recording of the same song on _The Muppet Show_ record album.

-the bit where Phyllis explains Fozzie's electricity situation made me really think of Basil of Baker Street, you know from _The Great Mouse Detective_ and also the kids' books, where he knows everything about a client after he's just met them...(he's mentioned again in Chapter 12 and Chapter 19.)

-Fozzie reading "Dear Abbey" is from (drumroll please) _The Great Muppet Caper_, in a gag Fozzie has in the beginning of the movie; the editor at his, Kermit's and Gonzo's newspaper is mad at them for missing the scoop on the theft of Lady Holiday's necklace. He shouts out various versions of the headline from several different newspapers, then states _their_ headline: "Identical Twins Join Newspaper". He asks them which paper _they'd_ rather read, and Fozzie says, "I'd read the one that has 'Dear Abbey'." (And let me just point out, that gag about Foz and Kermit being "identical twins" and then the photograph of their "father" was the _single_ funniest event in my life for _days_ after I first saw it.)

-"Gags Beasley" is Fozzie's gagwriter, mentioned first in episode 14 of _The Muppet Show_ and apparently elaborated on in the later seasons. He allegedly wrote the famous "Banana Sketch", which frankly is funnier in the _not_ telling than it would have been had we actually gotten to hear it.

-"Or my writer, the hatrack"—in the Peter Ustinov episode, Kermit is explaining to Mr. Ustinov how almost anything can be a Muppet and informs Ustinov that the show's writer was a hatrack. And during the end credits for that episode, under "writers" it actually _says_ "The Hatrack". (Mr. Ustinov also made a guest appearance as the truck driver in _The Great Muppet Caper_, as well as in Chapter 10 of this story.)

-Fozzie's mother is, to my guessing, maybe Fozzie's only surviving parent, because _I've_ never heard of a father...but then again, I've only seen the first season of the TV show and she never appears in the movies (except for in a photograph at the beginning of _Muppets From Space_).

-Nick Charles—the famous detective from the _Thin Man_ movies, which I reference throughout pretty much this entire story.

-"maybe he left behind his resumé or his son or something"...that was (sort of) a line from this radio quiz show _Wait Wait Don't Tell Me_, where they were saying that a criminal in (coincidentally) Sweden was caught because he left behind at the scene of the crime either a) his business card, b) his son, or c) his resumé. (The answer was C, by the way.)

-Fozzie and the Groucho glasses...well, he wore them at "The El Sleezo Café" in _The Muppet Movie_, but I was thinking more of the sequence in (bum bum bum bum BUM) _The Great Muppet Caper_ where, to disguise themselves, _every single &ing Muppet wears Groucho glasses!!_ ,

-"struck a pose, wide-armed and open-mouthed"...the same pose Foz strikes when asked to be visually compared to Kermit in, give the good man twenty dollars, _The Great Muppet Caper_!!

-if you don't recognize the _Star Wars_ joke when Foz gets the trenchcoat...that's a problem. (Plus it's doubly ironic 'cus that's the Yoda line and Frank Oz performed Yoda, and Frank Oz performed Fozzie, and so...OK, I just killed it. Sorry.)

-a bowler hat was what Fozzie's cousin wore in his minor appearance in Fozzie's comedy routine during episode 22 of Season One. (in case you're wondering why I know all about the Season One stuff specifically, well, I got the Season One DVD set and I'll be hyperventilating 'till the next one comes out. I've watched all of Season One _three times_ already, and it _just keeps getting better_.)

-The tagline to that last in-joke is an in-joke in itself, as in the movie _Beetlejuice_, the title character proclaims "I've seen _The Exorcist_ 167 times, and it JUST KEEPS GETTING FUNNIER."

-Statler and Waldorf have done several hearing aid jokes before, so I can't reference just one for that crack...

_**CHAPTER 6**_

-Mortimer Snerd was Edgar Bergen's secondary ventriloquist dummy, and was lovably the original "idiot", the basis of characters like Goofy and Beaky Buzzard.

-and yes, referring to that character as "Chief Sweetums", even just as text on a computer screen, is _really_ hard to do with a straight face.

-"Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear" was the number Scooter sang with Fozzie in the _very_ historical episode 1 of _The Muppet Show_. It was originally, in the episode, supposed to be "Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing _Dog_", but Muppy (Scooter's dog) canceled at the last minute and Kermit roped Fozzie into going onstage instead. Plus, the song "Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear" was written by Randy Newman! (As you'd know if you actually read those stupid little footnotes at the end of the chapters, but then again I wouldn't if I was reading it.)

-you'll notice that the bit of dying/being hurt by a misfired rubber chicken is a running gag in my Muppets stories, as it makes its appearance both here _and_ in my Fozzie mockumentary, and is also scheduled for a cameo in my next Muppets story...which I haven't even _started_ yet.

-eleven Oscars is the number the movie _The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King_ was both nominated for _and_ received.

-Muppy and Baskerville: I don't know if they are commonly known or not, but they're two Muppet dogs. Baskerville was Rowlf's "sidekick" character on _The Jimmy Dean Show_, and was named after the hound in the Sherlock Holmes book that Rowlf liked in Chapter 2. Muppy, on the other hand, was Scooter's sweet-looking-but-violent-and-egotistic dog who, as stated before, was the reason why we have "Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing_ Bear_" as opposed to "_Dog_", so he can't be _all _bad...

-Muppet Labs is the laboratory where all of Bunsen's inventions are made during the TV skits, and the slogan for Muppet Labs actually _is_ "working to better the world situation" (or is it "Where the future is being made today"?). This shows up again in Chapter 15. Plus, originally it was only Bunsen on those sketches, but in Season Two or something they added Beaker so, as stated in the informative-but-not-applicable-to-most-real-life-situations "Muppet Morsels" bonus track on the DVDs, "he would no longer have to blow _himself_ up during his experiments".

-the exploding hats, earmuffs (as well as the "double-barreled effect" bit) and neckties were all Dr. Honeydew inventions from _The Muppet Show_ Season One, episode 18, and all of them exploded _while he was wearing them_. As for the exploding socks mentioned in Chapter 15, well, I was just being silly.

-shortening "Oznowicz" to "Oz" is just what Frank himself did, but that was _before_ Bunsen.

-Hilda was the costume lady at _The Muppet Show_ during Season One until her character was retired...it was rather interesting that they got rid of her, though, because she was used a lot to bridge some of the sketches, and the guest stars interacted with _her_ almost as much as Kermit.

-the Gorilla Detector is one of the most famous Muppet Labs skits (ep. 16), and the Gorilla Detector is even featured in the action figure playset. It's supposed to light up whenever a gorilla is in the room, and the "in..._several_ circumstances" that Bunsen references was from his own sketch with it, where he knew by "scientific principle" that he could _prove_ that he was _not_ being eaten by a gorilla, as the detector hadn't gone off. ...And the gizmo lit up and started flashing only _after_ Bunsen was dragged off-camera by the primate.

-everyone's done the gag where they list a bunch of good traits about themselves and then end the list with modesty, so I don't even _remember_ specifically where I got that one from.

-"Fearless Fosdick" was a segment in the _Li'l Abner_ comic strip about this really stupid detective. It was a parody of Dick Tracy, and Li'l Abner's, and every other "red-blooded American boy's" hero, even though his "author" in the strip was _proven_ scientifically that he was _completely_ and _utterly_ insane. (There was even one story, my favorite, about how Fosdick caught a murderer _Chippendale Chair._)

_**CHAPTER 7**_

-I am _not_ trying to make fun of _any_ religion with my comment about berserk evangelists so if you feel that way please, I didn't mean it like that, but it's just there was a Woody Allen radio routine where he said word-for-word "berserk evangelist", so that's why it's in here.

-Fozzie and ginger ale comes from (you'll never guess...) _The Great Muppet Caper_, where he comments that "if you put enough sugar in this stuff champagne, it tastes just like ginger ale".

-Animal, true to name, is always on the lookout for women. He's kind of like a feral Harpo Marx like that...He even prefers blondes, just like ol' Harpy.

-the concept of Floyd and Zoot switching off as Janice's boyfriend came from the fact that in Season One Janice is always with Zoot, whereas later in the series she's barely ever seen without Floyd.

-Floyd is pretty much the only guy who really has the ability to control Animal in any way, shape or form...but even _his_ authority is limited.

_**CHAPTER 8**_

-you know ol' Humphrey Bogart, he always had his hands in those pockets...

-I am _not_ comparing _The Muppetburg Times_ to _The Daily Planet_, but that's the simile I thought of. I was more thinking of The Electric Mayhem's van while I was describing the exterior paint design.

-and Jerry Juhl was the head writer on _The Muppet Show_ and several of the movies, so it's only fitting that he (or at least probably a Muppet version of him) founded _The Muppetburg Times_. Also, coincidentally, he was in part responsible for the creation of Lew Zealand, the _editor _of this newspaper (well for a _while_ he was the editor)...well anyways, apparently Juhl or someone had hired a British writer to help with the script for one of the episodes, and the guy just said to Juhl, "Lew Zealand: throws boomerang fish" and Juhl added him to the script without any further description.

-the crack Waldorf makes about Statler and Queen Victoria was based on a joke from the Connie Stevens episode of _The Muppet Show_ (ep. 2) where after Connie sings "Teenager in Love", Statler comments, "I was a teenager in love once." And Waldorf says, "Yeah, but Queen Victoria wouldn't have you!"

-the joke Phyllis plays on Kermit—opening the door and creeping inside without him seeing—was, as I have only _just_ realized from episode 21 of _The Muppet Show_. Uncle Deadly was trying to scare the Muppets out of the theater as "The Phantom of _The Muppet Show_", so at one bit while Kermit was just sitting at his desk the door slowly and mysteriously opens. He freaks out only a little, but just keeps on working. _Then_ Uncle Deadly comes in, and _that_ was the end of _that_.

-the "you scared me out of ten years' warts" bit that Kermit says, while the joke in there is obvious, I have _also_ only just realized came from "The Phantom of _The Muppet Show_" episode, where Kermit thinks that it was George the Janitor scaring everybody with a mask. He accuses George of "scaring him out of ten years' growth—and at this point he can't afford to get any smaller". Then Uncle Deadly appears on the stairs, and they realize if _George_ was down there, who was up _there_—and everyone runs away screaming.

_**CHAPTER 9**_

-"hitching a ride on the back of a bus", while not specific to any root source besides the illegal activities of young hoodlums in the forties, _I_ picked it up from the movie _Who Framed Roger Rabbit_ when Eddie catches a free ride on the back of the Red Car bus (also referenced in Chapter 16).

-the "bulbous yellow guy from 'Hugga Wugga' " was the little character in that song who just popped out of the mist and started singing "You Are My Sunshine". This wasn't my_ favorite_ musical number, but I liked that little guy and how he concluded the routine by blasting away the big "Hugga Wugga"-singing guy.

-"those pink cow-like things", as Phyllis doesn't have the opportunity to know, are called "Snowths". They were performed, one on each hand, by Frank Oz while Jim Henson was Mahna Mahna.

-"Michelle Oznowicz", of course, is a variation on my "Mike Oznowicz" gag from the beginning. I honestly have no idea whether or not there is a Michelle in the Oz family tree.

-Paul Williams, as at least some of you should know if you read those annoying little authors' notes at the ends of the chapters, is the genius songwriter who wrote a bunch of songs for the Muppets (like all the songs in _The Muppet Movie_ and _Muppets Christmas Carol_) and also appeared in episode 8 of _The Muppet Show_.

-Richard Hunt is (or rather, _was_, sad to say) the mastermind behind Scooter the Gofer, (I believe) Janice, and Wayne, as well as Miss Piggy's initial performer before Frank Oz took over.

-the "Marx brothers mirror routine", one of their funniest visual gags, debuted in their fifth film _Duck Soup_ and was revived for Harpo's guest appearance on _I Love Lucy_. It involved a full-sized mirror being knocked out with two people on either side, each looking identical to the other; the one, suspicious, makes several motions, but the other mirrors just as if it _was_ a real mirror. They even _circle around each other_ and back to their own sides of the "mirror" before they suddenly realize all of it. (The Muppets even used it _themselves_ once before in either episode 2 or episode 3 of _The Muppet Show_, where Scooter ordered a robotic Kermit and Kermit did the routine with it by accident. It was also in one of those old Mickey Mouse cartoons where Goofy does the "Mirror" with a ghost.)

-about "Marvin Suggs having some things in his dressing room that the cops might like to see", Frank Oz, his performer, always said that he imagined Suggs living in a scuzzy trailer park with his put-upon wife, and that he'd keep the Muppaphone in a cage and beat them regularly—someone call the Humane Society!!

-the suit I describe (purple-and-red pinstriped) was Floyd's from at least _The Great Muppet Caper_. And by the way, did you notice that in the number _The Happiness Hotel_, we first see Floyd in his regular outfit—the red shirt and cap—when the bellhop rats go by, then when it's the part in the song with The Electric Mayhem he's suddenly in that suit? _How does he do it?!_

-"never smoked, through his mouth or anywhere else"—there was a corny "At the Ballroom" joke during _The Muppet Show_ Season One where a guy asks his partner, "Mind if I smoke?" and smoke comes out of his ears as well as several other parts of his body, filling up the room.

-"Mr. Bassman" was a song that The Electric Mayhem sang with Scooter in episode 24 (of _The Muppet Show_, of course. What, did you think it was from _The Munsters_ or something?).

_**CHAPTER 10**_

-the Swedish Chef _has_ done that before, where he shoots a "muffin" through the center and calls it a "doughnut".

-Wayne's Napoleon costume is the one he wears during the theme song sequence from _The Muppet Show_ Season One, and it's just my favorite one so that's why it's in here.

-my philosophical speech about Muppets being trusting and kind is _my_ attempt at an explanation for the sorts of moral and ethical lessons they always have on _Sesame Street_.

-the "wearing nametags" was a gag I borrowed from my other fanfic, "Journeys of a Space Cadet", a _Duck Dodgers_ one.

-"Just call me 'Great' " was from the Joel Grey episode, ep. 6, just before Grey started singing "Give 'em the old Razzle-dazzle". (May I also note with some bitterness that that episode marked Gonzo's final appearance on the show for a while.)

-the purple tuxedo is pretty much stock Muppet wear, and even Kermit—who's usually not in _any_ sort of costume—has worn it numerous times.

-"it's always the one you think is just there to annoy you that has the important information that you need to solve the case"—a reference to the fact that in _The Cocoanuts_, as well as other Marx movies, Harpo is the one who finds out the terrible secret and _he's_ the one who _can't talk_.

-"taking a night class in chicken"—well, taking _any_ course in chicken, as I have _also_ just realized, is from a _Far Side_ comic strip about when chickens go to high school they have to learn "Beginning Duck". Why do I have all these pointless facts in my head that just _coincidentally_ tie in with the rest of the story?!

-Gonzo actually has been in love with Miss Piggy a few times throughout the series—the first time this shows up is in episode 24, when he keeps pestering Miss Piggy and doesn't even realize that she hates him.

-"...in the caper I was about to pull off." Notice one _specific_ word in this sentence and _then_ guess the hidden reference.

-"Reach for the floor"—a line Foz used in the "The Day Kid Fozzie Came to Town" sketch from episode 1 of _The Muppet Show_. In a nutshell, it was a parody of John Wayne's cowboy flicks, and Fozzie fires off with a pair of _pickles_, as well as pulling out a _carrot_ as his "knife" and a _lit apple_ for a bomb.

-the "sticking my finger in the small of one of their backs and hoping they thought it was a gun" was borrowed from Bob Wright's Muppets fanfic "Who Framed Kermit the Frog" (on this very website), where Gonzo pretends that he has a gun and the head bad guy says "You idiots, that's not a gun that's his _finger!_" It's also one of my favorites of the non-ReneeLouvier Muppets fanfics.

-Peter Sellers, Avery Schrieber and Bruce Forsythe, three amazing comedians, all appeared on _The Muppet Show_ at various times. Also referenced at the same time as Forsythe was Foz complaining how he never got back at Stat and Waldorf—something that Bruce Forythe, ep. 12, helped him do.

-"Smokey"—you know, "Only you can prevent forest fires". _That_ bear.

-the banjo—Kermit's famous instrument.

-"when he lived in the swamp"...well, _The Muppet Movie_ opened with Kermit in a swamp, so that obviously must be where he grew up...not to mention that the movie about Kermit as a kid was called _Kermit's Swamp Years_. (Incidentally, I have not yet seen this movie, but the next chance I have to go to the library I'm checking it out.)

-perhaps Kermit's most famous piece besides "Bein' Green", "The Rainbow Connection" is an obvious song to have started Kermit's career in this story since it kickstarted his first movie.

_**CHAPTER 11**_

-I know Fozzie usually plays some sort of string instrument—it looks kind of like either a miniature guitar or a ukelele, I think a ukelele—but the kazoo fits his character more, and besides his other instrument was probably at _his_ home, not Phyllis's and Kermit's flat.

-the Homburg (sp?) hat comes into play just because it was mentioned in a Groucho Marx radio routine with Bing Crosby where he was trying to sue Crosby for splashing mud on his client's dress, even though it's obviously a frame-up shyster attempt. (I notice now that while _The Thin Man_ is made public throughout the entire story, the majority of my in-jokes are about the Marxes. CURSE YOU, TCM!!)

-I actually _do_ make certain random attempts at the acoustic guitar, like Phyllis, but I'm tone-deaf (which Phyllis admits of herself in Chapter 13), my guitar is probably less tuned than a tuna fish and I completely suck at it. But at least my non-talent has become famous here through my fictional character.

-the stuff about the sewer place and how "life isn't always just how it appears on Kodak commercials" is my personal perspective of the Universe, because you always see these happy "come on down" ads for Jamaica while, to my understanding, the other 98 of that place is dirt poor and run-down.

-though there are probably a lot more Muppets that fit the description of the bouncer at the sewer place, I based this guy on the Muppet from episode 2 of _The Muppet Show_, who was part of the group who did backup for Connie Stevens in her "Teenager in Love" number. The group of them was called "The Mutations", which is referenced by Pépe in Chapter 12.

-the thing about Kermit actually _sounding_ like an out-of-work musician because of his slang was like one of the _only_ funny scenes in _Song of the Thin Man_ where Nick and Nora go to a party for musicians and Nora immediately picks up the lingo like a natural.

-"reading lines off a cue card"—I don't know which episode this was from, but one of the ones with a female costar (Florence Henderson? Lena Horne?) had a gag about cue cards during the "talk spot". And once again, I only just realize this now.

-all that stuff about Muppet "skin" drying up and "toast", as Statler and Waldorf so graciously explain, _is_ completely true. It's just one more of the many ordinary, everyday completely useless entertaining facts that you learn when you watch _The Muppet Show_ with "Muppet Morsels" captions.

-as you might have noticed, with the songs I try my best to have all the lines performed by the same characters who did them in whatever the original source was. So in the bit with "The Magic Store", I had Phyllis do the Miss Piggy and Gonzo lines since those two weren't conveniently nearby.

- Rufus T. Firefly—Groucho Marx's alias in _Duck Soup_

Emmanuel Ravelli—Chico Marx's alias in his and Groucho's radio show _Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel_, as well as in _Animal Crackers_

J. Cheever Loophole—Groucho's alias from _A Day At the Circus_ (not one of my personal favorites of their films—my _absolute_ favorite is _Monkey Business_—but I adore the name...PLUS it's Groucho's alias when he sings "Lydia the Tattoed Lady", one of Jim Henson's own favorite songs and one Kermit performs in episode 2 of _The Muppet Show_.)

-as you might have noticed had you read one of the many annoying little author's notes, the bit about "I'm Gonna Always Love You" being written for Miss Piggy by Jeff Moss is actually completely true. He wrote all the songs for _The Muppets Take Manhattan_, and also wrote for the Muppets Ernie's trademark "Rubber Duckie".

-the trumpet player who almost overhears them in the sewer cavern is Lips, who played for The Electric Mayhem later on in _The Muppet Show_. But I believe in the "old-school" traditional group, so he was excluded from their ranks for this story.

-Stat and Waldorf's wandering commentary at the end of Chapter 11 was based on one of the routines they do on one of the Season One DVDs if you leave the menu screen on for too long. Sometimes I just leave the screen without doing anything, just to see what they'll say...and yes, I _do _believe I'm a shoo-in for the next annual "Pathetic Losers Without a Life" award in the "Hopeless Nerds" category. (I'll at _least_ take bronze.)

_**CHAPTER 12**_

-calling Pépe a shrimp is sort of a mockery of that running gag where everyone always calls Pépe a shrimp, but he explains that he is a quote-unquote "king prawn".

-_Playprawn_ is obviously a play on _Playboy_, but also in Douglas Adams's series _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ there's a bit of a recurring joke about a magazine called _Playbeing_. (Though this is _totally_ off-topic, my favorite gag about it is from, I think it was either _The Restaurant at the End of the Universe_ or _Life, the Universe and Everything_—I think it was _Restaurant_—but anyways, it said of the galactic location Ursa Minor Beta that _Playbeing_ wrote in an article "When you're tired of Ursa Minor Beta, you're tired of life". It went on to say that the suicide rate there tripled overnight.)

-the "feminine charms" thing is a _very_ direct reference to Pépe's disturbingly lecherous nature. The word "lecherous" I borrow from _Inuyasha_ by Rumiko Takahashi, because it describes Miroku to a "T" as _well_ as Pépe. As an aside, if anyone has ever read Ken Akamatsu manga like _Love Hina_ and _Negima_, then they'll agree with me that Pépe would sell his soul to join the cast of those stories.

-Fozzie pulling a whoopee cushion out of the pocket of _Kermit's_ suit is from another line in _Who Censored Roger Rabbit_, where Roger is wearing a suit borrowed from Eddie Valiant and somehow manages to pull a magnifying glass out of the pocket—even though Eddie had never _put_ a magnifying glass in the pocket of that suit.

-The Clodhoppers were the backup dancers in episode 20 of _The Muppet Show_ for the number "Nobody Does it Like Me" with Valerie Harper.

-Nigel was the conductor for the pit orchestra in _The Muppet Show_.

-The Happiness Hotel is pretty much one of the only settings in this story that I didn't have to invent myself, so the description of the whole place—including Foz, Kermit and Phyllis's room—is pretty much the same as in _The Great Muppet Caper_, though with a few modifications. _And_ I can even explain away the British flag there, because instead of symbolizing that the Hotel is in London—as in the movie—I can claim that it's a symbol of the "British invasion" in rock n' roll. HA! Take THAT!

-the sequence where they enter the Hotel and ask for a room, from their entrance to when they're asked for their names, is almost _word-for-word_ the same as the matching sequence in _The Great Muppet Caper_, even to the point where Pops is asleep when they go in.

-the three Muppets (besides Pops) who say "Somebody's checkin' in?" are the three "caricature" Muppets, as I call them (known by _normal_ people as "The Country Trio"): the first one is the Frank Oz Muppet, the second is the Jim Henson Muppet, and the third is the Jerry Nelson Muppet. The variation they each do on "somebody's checkin' in" (each accenting a separate word) is based on a part from a radio routine Groucho had on the Dinah Shore Bird's-Eye program, where another guy says to Groucho in disbelief "You'll _take_ it? _You'll_ take it?" and Groucho replies "There's still another variant of that: you'll take _it_.".

-the bit where Phyllis asks to remain nameless and everyone freezes, then they're like "OK, whatever" is a gag from the manga _Comic Party_ by Sekihiko Inui. Kazuki has to get his comic book checked before he can sell it at his booth at the convention, so he has the Comic Party official, Minami, read it to make sure it's appropriate and everything. She picks it up, opens it and then there's this sudden pause pause where you're like "OHMIGOD!", and Kazuki's thinking "Oh no, oh no, oh no..." Then Minami just shuts it, smiles and says "It's all fine."

-the location of their room is _also_ from _The Great Muppet Caper_, because in their cab ride with Beauregard they tell him that they're on the second floor, and he apologizes because "he can only drive them as far as the lobby".

-you know what? I just realized that the sewer community at this point seems to be _amazingly_ like the Court of Miracles from _The Hunchback of Notre-Dame_ (you know, the gypsies' home, where all the brigands and crooks go?).

-the bit where Phyllis compares her thinking at the moment (whimsical) to what Bogart would have thought (hardcore, tough) is like a bit in one of the episodes of _Duck Dodgers_, where Dodgers is on a "Survivor"-like game show and he's almost won one of the trials. The host asks him, "What's on your mind right now?" expecting an intense answer, and Dodgers says, "Actually, I'm thinking about butterflies. They _really_ creep me out!" And so obviously a butterfly just _conveniently_ appears right then, and Dodgers freaks out so much that he zooms across the finish line in an attempt to outrace it.

-comparing the conversation to a tennis game is like the debate segment of _The Muppet Show_ from episode 10 where Miss Piggy argues with Harvey Korman over whether or not life is like a tennis game. The bit about "the ball being in my court now" is from that same sketch.

_**CHAPTER 13**_

-Nigel's soliloquy about being forgotten is mostly true; truthfully, who off the top of their head remembers him? He was originally slotted to be the host for _The Muppet Show_ and was filmed as such in the pilot episode, but he was considered "too wimpy" and Kermit took his place. The first time any of the fans really ever _see_ Nigel is in episode 23 when the pit orchestra threatens to quit. (Well, in episode 2 he gives Zoot his sheet music and has a couple of lines, but that doesn't really count.)

-Miss Mousey was the mouse Phyllis notices in the hallway while they were breaking into The Electric Mayhem's room. She made her debut in the Ethel Merman episode (ep. 22) singing "Don't Sugar Me" while sitting in a teacup in Statler and Waldorf's balcony seats.

-"The Monkeys" is obviously making fun of British band The Monkees, and "Strike Jones and his City Sneakers" is a poke at the slightly lesser-known Spike Jones and his City Slickers, a band who did lots of wacky songs back in the fifties or somewhere and were the inspiration for "Weird Al" Yankovic. "Jimi Hen-drips" is pretty clearly Jimi Hendrix. (By the way, my vision of "Jimi Hen-drips" looks mostly like another Muppet character called "T.R. Rooster"...but I only really know the name and the likeness, no idea what he's from besides a few circumstantial appearances in _The Muppet Show_ Season One.)

-"left-handed guitars"—this isn't just because almost all the Muppets are left-handed (their performers were usually right-handed and had to use their right hands to puppet the heads), but Douglas Adams, the author of _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_, also collected left-handed guitars as he _himself_ was left-handed. He is also one of the only authors who has ever jammed with the band Pink Floyd, which _I_ think is pretty cool.

-"Manhattan Melodies", as some may recognize, is the Broadway musical that Kermit and company were trying to sell during the movie _The Muppets Take Manhattan_ (one of my _least_ favorite Muppet movies, but unlike several critics I like the songs in it). The story was that they had just graduated from college, so that's why Kermit supposedly wrote it after _he_ graduated in this story.

-Lord Lew Grade is the "media magnate" (I have _no_ idea what that means, but that's what it says in the CD booklet) who gave Jim Henson the rights to produce the first 24 episodes of _The Muppet Show_ in London, so that's why I christened _him_ the guy that Kermit sent "Manhattan Melodies" to. That, and I can't remember (or even care) who that guy was that produced the musical in _Muppets Take Manhattan_, I just remember that he looked like Napoleon Dynamite-slash-"the son of Woody Allen".

-all the songs on the desk in The Electric Mayhem's room are songs that The Electric Mayhem has performed at some point or other, whether in a movie or on the TV show. ("Can You Picture That?" is from _The Muppet Movie_, they did "Jam" in episode 10 of _The Muppet Show_, "Ain't Misbehavin' " was sung by Floyd in _The Muppet Show_ episode 2, and "Love You to Death" is also from episode 10.)

-"El Sleezo" is, of course, based on "the El Sleezo Café", the place where Kermit met Fozzie in _The Muppet Movie_. But "El Sleezo" is too shady a name to waste on a _café_, really...

-I can't tell if Janice's "catchphrase" is "for surely" or "for sure-really", so I smushed them together into "for sure-lly". This is probably the most irrelevant of all the little comments here, but look, I'm bored and this is _already_ an insanely long list of in-jokes and I'm only up to listing the ones from Chapter 13, so...yeah, whatever.

-Zoot "losing his groove" is from _The Muppet Movie_, when they're in the church and Zoot can't remember his name, which Floyd explains by saying that Zoot "lost his groove again".

-"going off into space, we can't afford a rocket"...that pathetic joke is my reference to _Muppets From Space_. Thank you, no applause please.

-when Phyllis says "Go for it", I have also just realized that I have _once again_ unknowingly cited _The Great Muppet Caper_—how long can I keep this up?—because near the climax when everyone's getting ready to go to The Mallory Gallery _everyone_ says "Go for it"; Nicky, all the Muppets, and Miss Piggy's jailmates.

-"five-foot-tall rooster playing the guitar with his tongue"—from what I've heard, that sounds _very_ much like Jimi Hendrix (hopefully not the rooster part though).

-"stifling a sneeze so as not to be found"—in the TV show _My Favorite Martian_ episode 3 "There is no cure for the common Martian", Uncle Martin (the Martian) has a cold, and every time he sneezes he turns invisible. So using this to his advantage, he sneaks into a private meetin between his "nephew" Tim and the owner of a toy store, and when Uncle Martin feels another sneeze coming on Tim has to stifle the invisible Martian's sneeze or else Uncle Martin will pop back into visibility and be discovered.

-after Phyllis's line about "last successfully running a three-minute mile", I was reminded of a _Looney Tunes_ comic that I have with a Duck Dodgers story where Dodgers says "Fast? Pfft! Duck Dodgers knows _fast_! Why, I ran the three-minute mile in under an _hour_ once!"

-"Running like the Dickens"—I don't know the origin of that phrase, but I used that particular expression as a (sort of) tribute to _The Muppets Christmas Carol_...the reference should be obvious, or else you _really_ need to study up on your classics.

_**CHAPTER 14**_

-Doctor Watson, in case you share with "Chief Sweetums" in not knowing, was Sherlock Holmes's assistant. And as an aside, Dr. Dawson from the Basil of Baker Street series parodies him as Basil parodies Sherlock.

-um, I _think_ that "Fonzie" is from _Happy Days_...I don't watch it 'cus I'm more of a _Munsters_-_Andy Griffith_-_Gilligan's Island_-_Leave it to Beaver_-and-_Green Acres_ person when it comes to TVLand...

-Lt. Columbo was the protagonist of a series of TV movies, all of which are kind of funny (at the right points, that is) but still pretty cool. _Columbo_ as a show was also referenced during _The Muppet Show_ at one point, in the Bruce Forsythe epsisode (ep. 12), when Forsythe commented that America and England are always exchanging drama shows. _Columbo_ was one of the ones he mentioned coming from the U.S. (I have also just realized that the guy I mentioned in the in-joke list for Chapter 1, the one who told Kermit Kermit's own "life story", was _Peter Falk_, the guy who _played_ Lt. Columbo!!)

-"Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" ending in a meteor crash is borrowed from the fanfic "The Sad Story of Wayne and Wanda" by The Blue Paratroopa (on this website), just 'cus I thought it was hysterical.

-"You must be the lovely Miss Piggy/Yes I must be", you know, the part right before "The First Time it Happens", was a variation on a line from _The Great Muppet Caper_ in exactly the same sequential order (right before that same song) where Miss Piggy insists to Kermit "After all, the night is young and I am so _beautiful_." Actually, Miss Piggy has a _lot_ of lines in her career that this one could deviate from, but oh well.

-it'd be hard to miss the reference to Kermit's famous song after Phyllis threatens to "strangle him until he turns green again".

-when Beauregard asks Phyllis to repeat the question, that's a follow-up to my previous Mortimer Snerd reference; Mortimer's famous routines with Edgar Bergen usually involved Bergen asking Mortimer a simple question and Mortimer needing large quantities of clarification.

-"Exuberant Hour", as can be seen, is the Muppetburgian "Happy Hour", which is kind of funny since Muppets are _always_ bright and cheerful, so...yeah. Well, I _hope_ it's funny, anyways.

-the scene with Rowlf before he sings "I hope that somethin' better comes along" is similar to the scene in _The Muppet Movie_ before he sings that same song. Originally I had been going to use a different song for this scene, but then I saw _The Muppet Movie_ again and decided on the current one. It wasn't until a while after I'd typed in the lyrics that I noticed the amazing similarity between the two scenes, and then of course I had to go back and _elaborate_ on the similarity to make them almost identical.

_**CHAPTER 15**_

-Waldorf really _does_ have a wife, named Astoria; both of them are named after the hotel in New York. Statler is also named after a hotel (the Hotel Statler. Original, I know.) As an aside, I have also recently learned that Astoria is Statler's sister, making Statler and Waldorf brothers-in-law, which is kind of weird because I always assumed that they were just heckling friends who met in kindergarten and made fum of all the other kids in school.

-"Trekkie", you know, hardcore _Star Trek_ fan. ...Not that I _am_ one (for once being _serious_—I've never even SEEN _Star Trek_, ANY of the generations), but I've seen enough Archie comics and whatnot to know what they can be like.

-Dr. Strangepork, as you probably remember but I am going to state anyways to try and present the illusion of being smart, was the scientist character in the "Pigs In Space" sketches. Link Hogthrob himself, the captain, appeared in Chapter 24 near the end of the story.

-Muppet Labs Tenderizer was the invention from Bunsen's first appearance on _The Muppet Show_ in episode 8, and also the kick-off for the rest of the Muppet Labs sketches.

-Fozzie's crack about "ex-variables" is a variation on a line from an _Animaniacs_ comic book where Yakko is asked about all of his exploits—Yakko replies, "I don't have any _ex_-ploits. All my _ploits_ are still _ploits_." (I HEART ROB PAULSEN! _GO YAKKO AND PINKY!!_)

-though I borrow most of the Muppet Labs products from _The Muppet Show_, aside from the exploding socks (mentioned earlier), I also myself made up the Flare Pen because I couldn't think of any Muppet Labs items that resembled a pen. Also personally made up are the Action Hero Laser and Zebra De-Striper because I couldn't think of a Muppet Labs product that started with either letter "A" or letter "Z".

-"Raposicus Joesium" is a crack at the Muppet songwriter, Joe Raposo. If you read all of those annoying authors' notes that I put at the end of musical chapters, you'll know that Raposo wrote the music for _The Great Muppet Caper_. Raposo also wrote for the Muppets Kermit's song "Bein' Green".

-"Jackicus Parnellium" is a reference to Jack Parnell, who conducted the orchestra that played for _The Muppet Show_, and was also a very famous character in Britain where _The Muppet Show_ was filmed. (Vincent Price even made fun of him in episode 19 of _The Muppet Show_.)

-and to follow up my obsession with _The Great Muppet Caper_, I have a whole plot synopsis of the movie appearing very "subtly" in the timeframe of Phyllis's conversation with Dr. Strangepork.

-and yes, it _is_ a little conceited that I put myself in the story if only for a one-cough appearance, but oh well...that's the only way I could make that joke funny, even though making Statler and Waldorf ridicule my story-writing skills always makes me feel better because, hey, they heckled _The Muppet Show_, they obviously only take their time out to heckle something that's at least halfway decent!

-"walkin' along, singin' a song, side by side"—that's the song that Fozzie sang with Bruce Forsythe after Foz finally bested Statler and Waldorf.

-"Professor Netty Jennings" is a parody of Professor Newton Jennings, a character from episode 5 ("Man or Amoeba?") of _My Favorite Martian_.

**Here is a bulleted list of the different Muppet Labs products that Phyllis mentions in Chapter 15:**

-Growth Pills—I don't know what episode those are from because I found it on one of those tapes that splice together sketches from different episodes, but Bunsen really tested these on Beaker and made him grow so tall that Beaker extended off-screen. They're also in _The Muppet Movie_, though instead of stretching out Animal they instead scale him up until he's as big as a house.

-Robotic Politician—this is from the Peter Ustinov episode, with Ustinov playing the robot politician. He did impressions of several different nationalities of politicians before exploding.

-the Instant Door and Invisibility-Spray-Squirting Rubber Duckie were both from _Muppets From Space_ from when they had to sneak into the government building to get Gonzo.

-though the resemblance is totally irrelevant and completely coincidental, when Fozzie yells "I'll get it", that is currently reminding me of the running gag in _The Muppet Show_ episode 5 where whenever Fozzie yells "I'll get it" to answer the telephone, something really funny happens (i.e. he answers it and smoke pours out of the receiver—it's the fire department.) Even less relevant is the fact that in one of the early _Animaniacs_ episodes where Yakko, Wakko and Dot sub in as Mr. Plotz's secretary, whenever a phone rings they all yell "I'LL GET IT!" and subsequently wrestle for the phone.

-no, I _don't_ think that Fozzie can speak chicken, but I needed a loophole like that and, c'mon, that "rubber chicken" line is just priceless.

_**CHAPTER 16**_

-the "watch-me-do-this-and-maybe-you'll-forget-what-a-fool-I-just-made-of-myself routine" quote is from _Return to Howliday Inn_ by James Howe, describing Chester the egotistical, "I'm-always-right-and-you-know-it" cat.

-I'm sorry that Kermit acts so uncharacteristic when he hears Camilla say it was Miss Piggy and Gonzo, but I had to get them down to the "Theater" and Kermit thinking rationally just didn't seem to make the cut for possiblities. If I re-edited that part and forgot about it but didn't get rid of this line here, well, then just ignore this.

-this is also completely coincidental and pointless to say, but Phyllis yelling "Hold it" is the same as when Fozzie yelled "Hold it" in the opening to _The Great Muppet Caper_.

_**CHAPTER 17**_

-the thing Statler and Waldorf were saying about Romeo and Juliet ("No, but they should be here any minute") is a variation on a line from one of the Muppet Show episodes: Statler, clapping, yells, "Author! Author!" Waldorf sits up and asks, "Is he here yet?" "Who?" "Arthur."

-yes, I _do_ think that Miss Piggy has multiple personalities.

-this is as equally pointless as that other thing, but I picked up the word "truncated" from , 'cus on one of my friends' emails it listed the original message and when the message was too long, it said "message truncated". "Truncated" and "syncopation" are currently my favorite words just because they sound cool.

-and I have_ proof_ that someone takes out a gun and admits to all the charges in all of the _Thin Man_ movies.

-the existence of a "Christmas show" is from Renee Louvier's _awesome_ fanfics, but something _embarrassing_ happening at one is a fact I stole from one of the _Spongebob Squarepants_ episodes, even though I despise the show. But, as a way of reassuring myself on this point, I will now recognize here that, true to what Stat and Waldorf say, _all_ of the "embarrassing moments" on TV that are only given fleeting references happened at some sort of Christmas party...presumably because beside New Years's it's the most alcoholic holiday in America.

-"chutzpah" I just think is a cool word, like "syncopation" and "truncated". And, you know, I wrote it before I realized that not only was it _Jewish_, it was also pronounced "_HUTZ_-pah", not "_TCHUTZ_-pah". (This realization came from looking up the lyrics to "Weird Al" Yankovic's song "Pretty Fly for a Rabbi".)

-all the songs Miss Piggy references she _has_ sung at one point or another in the movies or the TV show. ("What Now My Love" she did in _The Muppet Show_ episode 15, "Never Before and Never Again" was her tedious, annoying number from _The Muppet Movie_, and "Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better" was Miss Piggy's part of the big Ethel Merman medley from _The Muppet Show_ episode 22.)

-actually, _After The Thin Man_ DOES have almost the same plot as the Camilla thing, but I won't give away the details if someone hasn't seen it yet.

-this is a really pathetic excuse to incorporate something, but the line where Miss Piggy's "toeing the carpet" was borrowed from the fanfic "King Thrushnose" by Daffywriter (on this site)—to which I am anticipating the conclusion, if said author may happen to be reading this. (Yeah right—who'd actually _read_ this far into such a boring section? Unless it was my _stellar_ wit..._and_ the fact that I'm _already_ enough of a nerd to be _writing_ this in the first place.)

_**CHAPTER 18**_

-piecing together the ripped-up piece of paper...the similarity isn't extraordinarily important, but the day I wrote that sequence I had just finished reading the Basil of Baker Street book _Basil Goes to Mexico_, and Basil had to do the same thing to gather one of his clues—though more easily, because _he_ only had _one_ sheet of paper to reconstruct, _and_ he got a bunch of little Mexican mice to do it for him.

-"Pachalafaka" is the name of a song performed during _The Muppet Show_ episode 3 by a pair of Whatnots—the male one, the singer, sings of his mysterious love, who's dancing all around him; then at the end of the song, he pulls off the mysterious lady's mask and "she" has a _mustache_.

-"D.U.N.G." is, of course, just "dung".

-the "two certainties in the world" quote was a variation on something Dave Goelz once said about being a Muppeteer—"When I'm doing the show, the only things I have time to worry about are death and laundry." Yet again amazing wisdom from the "Muppet Morsels" track that has no practical application elsewhere in life.

_**CHAPTER 19**_

-"as if he had to consciously try to remember what had happened when he had been awake"...there's not _too_ much similarity between the two, but just so I can tie together all the loose ends (even if they're tiny little threads that I just put there as an excuse to reference my favorite things), in the comic _Bone_ by Jeff Smith, there's a scene where Phoncible "Phoney" Bone, feeling paranoid, asks his cousin Smiley whether he'd seen any huge, rat-like monsters around. Then when Smiley takes a break to think about it, Phoney exclaims, "They're _monsters_, Smiley! You don't have to _think_ about it!!" to which Smiley replies, "Well, sometimes I have trouble distinguishing fantasy from reality."

-"like I'd just jumped thirty thousand feet out of a moving plane..." that one is from, again, _The Great Muppet Caper_—in the ending scene just before the credits, when they're on the plane the guy says that they're letting off everyone who wants to go to the US. Fozzie then asks how close they are, and the guy says, "Oh, about thirty thousand feet" and then he bodily throws them all out. (They had parachutes, though, so no worries. PHEW!)

-the "covered up like you're really invisible" line from Dr. Teeth reminded me for no apparent reason of the scene in _Muppets From Space_ where they use the aforementioned invisibility-spray-squirting rubber duckie to turn invisible and sneak into the government stronghold, then Fozzie gets them discovered because he washed off the spray that was on his hands after he used the bathroom.

-the line about the "fork in the road" was a direct reference to _The Muppet Movie_, because at that point in the song—during the movie, though not on the soundtrack—Kermit tells Fozzie that they have to turn left at the fork in the road, and Fozzie does so by turning left at an _actual _fork stuck in the middle of the road. (A side comment—look, if you know all about all these scenes and think that I'm wasting your time with them, well, a) sucks to be you and b) I'm doing this just to wrap up _everything_ in case someone doesn't know about some of these or they, like me, would totally forget without prompting.)

-Animal saying "go bye-bye" is a direct reference to that show we all _really_ hate to admit we watched, _Muppets Babies_. That was in a sense Animal's "catchphrase", though you can't really quote me on that because aside from a very faulty memory and the fact that it's been probably over ten years since I last saw that show, my only connection to it is through a _really old_ Marvel comic book. And by the way, I'd like to know when Disney's going to start releasing _that_ on DVD. (Hear _that_, Disney?! I'm talkin' to _you!!_) Wait a minute...do they even have the rights to it? It _was_ a Marvel production, after all...

-the phone-shaped candy dispenser that Pépe uses like a _real_ phone is from _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_, where he does the exact same thing while he and "Dorothy" are on the Yellow Brick Road. (As an aside, I'd really _hate_ to be Dorothy if Pépe was _my_ Toto.)

-"Marvo the Magician"—I have no idea whatsoever if he ever shows up again, but in episode 17 near the end of Season One, Fozzie accidentally locks himself in a trick box and can't get out. Kermit says that the box belongs to someone named "Marvo the Magician", who was touring somewhere else...but Foz eventually got out, though after doing his comedic segment on the show _while locked inside the windowless box_.

-"hit him with a rubber chicken—what, too subtle?" is from the Bruce Forsythe episode of _The Muppet Show_ (ep. 12), as Fozzie is trying to figure out a way to deal with Statler and Waldorf's heckling. He tries these out on Kermit, and he tells a joke, Kermit ridicules it and Fozzie tries out his newest method—which usually fails. At one point Fozzie tells a joke and Kermit says, "I've seen _cheeseburgers_ that're funnier than you!" Then with _no warning_ Fozzie takes out a rubber chicken and _slaps_ Kermit with it repeatedly, then stops and asks, "What? Too subtle?"

-have you noticed that when these in-jokes _aren't_ about _The Thin Man_ or the Marx Brothers and they're actually about the Muppets, an _alarming_ percentage of those revolve around Fozzie?

-speaking of _The Thin Man_, the movie _The Libeled Lady_ (starring the same two title actors as _The Thin Man_, William Powell and Myrna Loy) is this really crazy romantic comedy that only has libel to do as a catalyst. I just put it in there because I needed to use the word "libel" and I just made an immediate connection.

_**CHAPTER 20**_

-the "Alzheimers agnostic" line is from Eric Idle (of Monty Python)'s published diary of his solo tour (which I cannot print the title of because of an unsavory word contained therein), where in the margin of one of the pages he printed that same quote almost word-for-word.

-this is another completely irrelevant inconsequential thing—_oh no!_ you're probably weeping, if you made it this far—but the bit where the Chief adjusts to Phyllis's garbage dump odor within fifteen seconds is like the skit he does in the Avery Schrieber episode, where Avery and Sweetums duel with insults—when the duel ends in a tie, Avery protests, "But it wasn't his _insults_ that got me—it was his _breath!_"

-and everybody should know the "Crazy Harry" tendency to start blowing things up whenever somebody says something in any way related to that phrase. (It makes me think of this funny little line from _The Muppet Movie_, where near the end Harry giggles, "Crazy Harry plays with electricity!")

-since Beau was the janitor on _The Muppet Show_ after George was retired, it's only fitting that he would be the janitor for the police too...

-it's also only fitting that Beau would call Uncle Deadly a phantom, because Uncle Deadly's initial appearance during _The Muppet Show_ WAS as "The Phantom of the Muppet Show". (That's discounting his cameo as Dracula's assistant during the Vincent Price's episode 19 of _The Muppet Show_.)

-"cooking quite nicely" is based only _extremely_ loosely on a line from _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_ (personally just about my absolute _favorite_ bit in the movie), where Bunsen insists that they'll be fried by the Wizard's brilliance without the special glasses, then Ashanti points out that _Bunsen_ isn't frying, and _he_ forgot the glasses. So Bunsen pretends to writhe in pain as he cries "AHH!! Run, I'm frying, I'm cooking before your very eyes!!" before giving up and slinking quietly away...

-I was thinking of old "Ah-nuldt" at this point: "I'LL BE BACK!"

-and I _do_ believe that Uncle Deadly would be at least _one_ of the best lawyers in town, because he can always "haunt" the judge and jury, or at least scare them into submitting like he was almost able to do to Kermit during his "Phantom of _The Muppet Show_" stint.

_**CHAPTER 21**_

-Another random point, I would like to apologize if Uncle Deadly, Lew Zealand and Beauregard sound out of character during this story—well, _all_ the characters, but those three specifically. Uncle Deadly I have only really seen "in action" during a few episodes in Season One, Lew Zealand from the first three movies, and Beauregard from his role in _The Great Muppet Caper_, so as can be seen I have had limited experiences with all of these characters and must work from guesswork and impressions come across from reading fanfictions and fan sites and Wikipedia profiles. So, if they come across weird—that's the fault of underexposure.

-"Doc Hopper's" is, as should probably be known by most people who are reading this (though I have been mistaken in assumptions before, like Phyllis) the bad guy from _The Muppet Movie_ who owned a chain of frog leg restaurants and wanted Kermit to be his mascot.

-Lew Zealand's trademark quote ("I throw the fish in the air...they sail away...and then they come back to me!") is taken as close to word-for-word from its source as possible, to make up for everything else I _don't_ know about Lew.

-it's not really a very common expression anymore, but people used to wrap fish in newsprint—which meant that whatever newspaper they used was "only good enough to wrap fish in"—so that's where the humor is derived (I hope) from Lew Zealand's remark.

-Lew Zealand's fish "saving a guy from being married" is from what I have heard about Lew Zealand's premiere episode (which I unfortunately have not yet been privileged to see) where Kermit introduces Lew Zealand and his boomerang fish _just_ in time to avoid having to marry Miss Piggy during her so-called "wedding _sketch_" where she hired a _real_ priest.

-Lew Zealand's comment about how "he" always seems to answer the letters to the editor if stolen from the unfinished Dirk Gently novel _The Salmon of Doubt_ by Douglas Adams (reprinted in a collection of the same name after Adams's regrettable death). Dirk is explaining that every so often, he calls up his own number to see if the phone book has it listed right, and he says "And the funny thing is...every time I call my own number, I _answer_." Sometimes the quotation takes a while for you to wrap your brain around, but if you think about it long enough both Dirk's and Lew's version of it are actually kind of funny...I _really_ hope so...

-and as for Phyllis forgetting about the receipt, well, I myself _also_ kind of forgot about it at that point because I had to have Kermit go with them when they checked out the store, but he couldn't if he had to stay at work, so I made up all that stuff with the "accidental jam" and the surprise investigation just as a stall until Robin could take Phyllis to Doc Hopper's to see Lew, after which she, Fozzie and Kermit would check out El Sleezo and find out the "terrible truth". (I also somehow initially pictured this story as being a lot shorter and a _lot_ less complicated, but...well, I don't really seem to have made a Nostradamus of myself, have I?)

_**CHAPTER 22**_

-the "virtual reality glasses", if someone here's seen _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_, were those glasses thingies that Bunsen and Beaker made everyone wear if they had to see the Wizard, because the glasses gave you a different sight of what you were seeing...and that's why he had to try and get Ashanti and company to go back and _get_ the glasses, which I referenced in _another_ one of these incredibly annoying lists of in-jokes.

-Eren Ozker puppeted Wanda (of Wayne and Wanda) and Steve Whitmire did Beaker in (at least) _The Great Muppet Caper_ and replaced Jim Henson on Kermit after Henson's death.

-though I'd be surprised if anyone remembered them anymore, Laserdiscs were like the forerunners to DVDs, but they were really big, pretty unwieldy and could only play a series of chapters in sequential order, no possibility of a menu or anything. I think they were pretty cool, as some of my favorite movies and cartoons and stuff (like _Tom and Jerry_ and _Looney Tunes_ and _The Muppets Christmas Carol_) I personally only have access to on Laserdisc.

-since Scooter was the gofer on _The Muppet Show_, well, it makes sense that he'd believe that gofers have a bigger meaning in the scheme of things. (That was just put in there as a gag, though _I_ would have probably asked that of Scooter myself...)

-"Scooter knowing everything about the personal life of _everyone_ in Muppetburg" is actually kind of possible, since in _The Muppet Show_ (at least during Season One) he seems to always hear the wrong thing and pass it on to the wrong person. Case in point: in one of the episodes, Kermit cuts Miss Piggy's act because the guest star, Lena Horne, would be a _lot_ better than Miss Piggy. Miss Piggy, however, believes that Kermit cut her act so she wouldn't _overshadow_ the guest star. But later, Kermit gives Scooter a whole "it's lonely at the top, you have to be ruthless, merciless and cruel" speech and references his cutting of Miss Piggy's act. So, when Kermit leaves, Miss Piggy shows up and says how Kermit cut her act so she wouldn't overshadow the guest star. But _Scooter_ goes and tells her the _real_ reason, and both he and Kermit receive several karate chops in return.

-the line "What's the word on the street, Scooter?" is a direct reference to _Police Squad_ (mentioned before, in case you forgot), where whenever Lt. Frank Drebin aka Leslie Nielsen needed information from the shoeshine guy, he would ask, "What's the word on the street, Johnny?" and slip him some cash. And the "word on the street" usually just _happened_ to coincide with whatever case Frank was working on—which is why it's (I _really_ hope) a little funny that _Scooter's_ word on the street _doesn't_.

-Edgar Bergen, already referenced earlier as Mortimer Snerd's ventriloquist (as well as, more famously, Charlie McCarthy's), was also one of Jim Henson's inspirations to start being a puppeteer. Edgar made a guest appearance during Season Two (?) of _The Muppet Show_ and had a _very_ short cameo with Charlie McCarthy in _The Muppet Movie_, after which he sadly died. And that, if you're wondering, is why it says "Dedicated to the memory and magic of Edgar Bergen" at the end of the movie. Plus, in that same far-fetched attempt at an explanation, Scooter mentions Edgar as having gone under the pseudonym "Ray Noble"; Ray Noble was the orchestra conductor and somewhat droll comedian who usually haunted _The Charlie McCarthy Show_.

-in _The Muppets Christmas Carol_ (my second favorite Muppet movie after _The Great Muppet Caper_), one of the (many) food items that Rizzo seems to _conveniently_ have during the course of the film is a bag of jellybeans.

-the "El Sleezo" in this story is different from the "El Sleezo" in _The Muppet Movie_, so that's why they're two different buildings as opposed to my just "adapting" (stealing) it from the movie like I did with The Happiness Hotel.

-"Koozbanian aliens" were the little alien guys in that sketch in one of _The Muppet Show_ episodes from Season One. Kermit was doing a by-the-minute "report" on their mating rituals, which ended with the two aliens exploding and turning into little baby Koozbanians.

-Lenny the Lizard isn't a very major player in the Muppets universe, as most folks if they even _know_ him don't know him by _name_, but anyways...he was this lizard guy. And he wasn't really bad, I just thought that he'd be the type who'd work part-time at El Sleezo or something...whatever, I'm just being weird and wasting your time. (But wait, haven't I been doing that for this whole section?)

-and to follow up my other "Simon Smith" joke from Chapter 6, apparently his likeness is known well enough in Muppetburg to rank bootlegging.

-that bit about Statler complaining that he realized he's been sitting on a tack...I don't remember which episode of _The Muppet Show_ that was from, but at the end of one of the episodes he says "That show brought a tear to my eye." Waldorf, surprised, asks, "Really?" And Statler says "Yeah...I'm sitting on a tack."

_**CHAPTER 23**_

-the bit about Phyllis's mind being like "a washing machine at full spin cycle" is a line I stole from this e-mail printout a friend showed me, titled "Why English Teachers Retire Early" and listing a whole bunch of analogies used in real high school essays—ones like "She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 legs missing", "Every time she spoke he heard bells, like she was a garbage truck backing up", "Her face was the shape of an oval that had been compressed by a Thighmaster", and, a personal favorite, "He spoke with the wisdom that comes from deep within, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those little pieces of cardboard with the holes in them and then goes around talking to kids at schools about only watching solar eclipses by using those little pieces of cardboard with the holes in them." But anyways, that analogy that Phyllis uses is a variation on this next one: "His mind was cluttered, each thought bouncing around, making and breaking alliances, like a pair of underwear in a washing machine without Cling-Free."

-the "U-shaped, pink-and-orange-striped Muppets from 'Java'" _are_ the two selfsame of that description, you know, the ones who look like the "Omega" symbol or something. (This in-joke explanation has been shortened for the following two reasons: a) I'm trying to make up for the almost obscene length of the previous in-joke listing, and b) I'm too lazy to go into more detail.)

-Janice tanning herself "with the help of a sun lamp" when someone suddenly crashes through the door is another reference to..._THE GREAT MUPPET CAPER_, where after Beauregard drives _through the wall_ into the Hotel, that's what Janice was in the middle of doing.

-"swearing like the Dickens"—unless you have a very bad memory, you'll already know what I cite (again) with this line.

-Floyd dog-napping Foo-Foo is _not_ a new concept; in one of those aforementioned "compilation" videos that splice episodes together, I saw one continuing bit where Miss Piggy needed someone to watch Foo-Foo for her, and everyone passed the responsibility on until Floyd ended up having to do it, 'cus there's no one else _left_. So he locked Foo-Foo in his dresser drawer, because "don't worry, he can breathe through the keyhole". Then Miss Piggy goes on a desperate search for her mysteriously missing pooch (including a _hilarious_ bit where she thinks that The Swedish Chef is talking about Foo-Foo when he's _really_ talking about some hot dogs he's cooking), and at the end of the episode we see Kermit onstage and Miss Piggy walks on with Foo-Foo. Kermit asks where Floyd is, and Miss Piggy says, "_don't worry, he can breathe through the keyhole_"!

**A quick run-down of the gigs The Electric Mayhem allegedly "couldn't play for":**

-"a ship looking for buried treasure"—_The Muppets Treasure Island_. The Electric Mayhem only really shows up _twice_ in the entire movie, but since the actors who played most of those characters had passed on, that might be understandable. (ROWLF doesn't appear at _all_ in that ENTIRE MOVIE, except for a brief cameo in the beginning!!) They actually _did_ get Tim Curry: he was Long John Silver.

-"The Poppy Fields"—the nightclub The Electric Mayhem played at during _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_.

-"Christmas party at rubber chicken factory"—_The Muppets Christmas Carol_, Scrooge's past; Fozzie as "Fozziwig", Scrooge's old employer _at_ the rubber chicken factory, had The Electric Mayhem play for him (as _well_ as a very young Statler and Waldorf!).

-"the college play"—_The Muppets Take Manhattan_. Say no more.

-"the bar mitzvah"—at the beginning of _Muppets From Space_, Gonzo explains that he's not performing at the bar mitzvah he was scheduled for, and he'd gotten The Electric Mayhem to take his place (and I don't know about you, but I love it when they all walk by in the conservative outfits and say "Mazel Tov"!)—and that's where the "replaced by a human cannonball" comes from.

-"the bus tour of London"—this one's kind of a shaky association, but _technically_ when they drive the Happiness Hotel bus to The DuBonni Club in _The Great Muppet Caper_ that's a "bus tour of London". So THERE!

-and yes, the "if this is the happiness I'd hate to see the sad" _is_ from _The Great Muppet Caper_.

-though this is _totally_ irrelevant and wastes your time _almost_ as much as all those quotes about "why English teachers retire early", one of George's most "famous" props was his mop, and that's why he uses it specifically here. (THERE! I'm DONE!! MOVING ON NOW!)

_**CHAPTER 24**_

-though that was kind of the point, this entire sequence of the revelation reminded me of the ending scene of all the _Thin Man_ movies.

-Janice's statement after everyone else has quieted down is a parody of the recurring joke (that is, it's "recurring" to me because it's in both _The Great Muppet Caper_ and _Muppets Take Manhattan_) where everyone starts talking at once, then everyone goes quiet except for Janice, who's in the process of saying something _rather_ embarrassing. As well, it has proven my steadfast belief that if you're saying something embarrassing, automatically everyone else around you shuts up.

-Phyllis refers to Link Hogthrob as "Cap'n" not just because of his status as the captain of the black market division of Muppet Labs, but also for his holding of that same position in "Pigs In Space"; the sketch itself gets a mention at the beginning of the epilogue.

-"honesty and goodness and blowing things up!"—truly what everyone should remember as the creed of Muppet Labs.

-the bit about Lew Zealand quitting his job as editor of _The Muppetburg Times _by simply taking a lunch break and never coming back is from one of the _Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ books, where they state that one of the original editors of the REAL Hitchhiker's Guide went to lunch one day and never returned; in his honor, every editor since then has been called simply the "Acting Editor", and some people still entertain the notion that the original editor had simply popped out for a croissant and would one day come back to them.

_**CHAPTER 25**_

-this is _almost_ as irrelevant as some of these other comments, but restraining the Chief by all of his limbs reminded me of the passage from the book _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory_ with Veruca Salt being described in the book as being pinned down with, I think it was twenty-five squirrels sitting on each of her appendages.

-the "chain of command" line reminded me of the gag in the fanfic "Muppets in Havoc in TVLand" by someone with the pen name "Me" (not used in this context as a _pronoun_, but as somewhat of a proper name for whoever wrote this...all right, this is confusing me), where there's this recurring bit about the "chain of command".

-and about Animal being a prison escapee...well, let me just say that when you think about it, it's not really _that_ far-fetched.

_**EPILOGUE**_

-if you don't recognize the HUGE reference to _The Muppet Show_ at the beginning of this chapter...you're probably in trouble.

-the Sherlock Holmes sketch that I mention Rowlf as being in was from one of the first episodes of _The Muppet Show_; he really _did_ play Holmes in a _really funny_ sketch where the murderer eats all the evidence against him, _including_ the maid, who was a witness! (It was one of the "British Spots" of the series, meaning it aired only in England, so unless you got the Season One boxed set it's probably missing from your collection.)

-"an octopus's garden"...well, the song "Octopus's Garden" was on _The Muppet Show_, one (or more) of those "compilation" series, _The Ed Sullivan Show_, and on the sing-along video too, and it's one of the _slightly_ more famous pieces, though it hasn't obtained the standing of stuff like "It's Not Easy Bein' Green".

-"shave and a haircut", the knock that got Roger out of hiding in that sequence in _Who Framed Roger Rabbit_ just before the car chase with Benny the Cab.

-...and there's my word "TRUNCATED" again!!

———

_Deleted Scenes, in case you lasted through all that..._

Hi, and welcome to the DELETED SCENES! I honestly don't know why anyone would be reading all this, as they'd probably have fallen asleep before I finished the in-joke list for Chapter 1, but I might as well put it in here in case somebody wants to know what horrors _almost_ made it into the plot.

_**Camilla and Rizzo**_

Rizzo was on the borderline of getting a bigger part in this story, because I had originally slotted him as a pickpocket (well, he proved _that_ one) who helped Phyllis with the Camilla frame-up by finding the pictures of Gonzo in either the incinerator or the garbage can in Camilla's dressing room. The whole "Camilla" thing actually ended up a _lot_ shorter than I had expected (praise the High Ones), and so Rizzo was relegated to a two-bit appearance. ...That is, until I decided that he was part of the whole "Lew Zealand frame-up" thing, but then again his part's still microscopic.

_**Gonzo**_

When this story was still in the "concept" stage, I had originally thought that the "arrangement" of the characters would be more like _The Great Muppet Caper_; Phyllis was originally supposed to _already_ know Gonzo and Fozzie, and Gonzo had been slotted as her assistant detective/photographer.

_**Animal**_

That bit at the end where Phyllis tells Floyd that Animal had been a maximum-security escapee had been slotted as more than just a side remark, and that was at first going to be part of the whole "Electric Mayhem Radio Wave Overrider" investigation. But that would've made the story even longer and _more_ complicated, so I just made it, as stated before, a side remark.

_**Rowlf**_

At first Rowlf was going to have a slightly bigger part, and that _he_ was somehow going to be involved with the "murder"...I don't remember much of this bit, but it says on one of the sheets I took notes on that Rowlf "wasn't a part of The Electric Mayhem's scheme, just in the wrong place during a 'murder'."

_**The Swedish Chef**_

The Chef was originally going to have a bigger part too, because apparently in my mind since no one can understand him, everyone thinks he's a part of a huge foreign conspiracy...but I just made that part of one of Statler and Waldorf's commentaries instead.

_**Beauregard**_

Beauregard was originally supposed to just show up for that one bit in the beginning of Chapter 6 before the Chief appears, but over the course of this work I expanded on him even more and, hey, now _he's_ the chief of police. (GO BEAU!!)

_**The Frenchman Who Always Gets Beaten Up**_

In the opening "act" of episode 5, the guest star (Rita Moreno) keeps beating up a Muppet "Frenchman" in a barroom location, with all these _great_ visual gags; during _The Muppet Movie_ when Kermit's in "The El Sleezo Café", you can see in the background a French guy in a red, striped shirt who's always getting slapped by his female companion, which is a direct reference to that episode. ANYWAYS, that Frenchman was supposed to appear at some point as a customer in Uncle Henson's Theater, but he just never showed up...guess he must've been left in an alley somewhere...

_**Muppet Labs and Dr. Strangepork**_

Originally Phyllis wouldn't ever have to go to Muppet Labs, and Dr. Strangepork wasn't ever going to show up. But then the receipt appeared, and I realized "Hey, I could make him Bunsen's colleague or something!", so he was shoved in there. Then out of that spun the whole "Black Market Division" sub-plot, but thankfully that had _always_ been relegated as simply a side remark at the end.

_**The Receipt**_

Speaking of the receipt and Muppet Labs, originally Phyllis was supposed to find both the Mr. Bassman matches _and_ the receipt in Floyd's dressing room at the Theater. But when I decided to include The Happiness Hotel (see next note), I took the receipt out of Floyd's old zoot suit pocket and stuck it on his desk in the Hotel instead.

_**The Sewer Community and The Happiness Hotel**_

At first, Mr. Bassman was supposed to be the _entire_ underground musician colony, and it was just a singular "apartment" in the old sewer system. But then I thought that I wanted to put The Happiness Hotel and, subsequently, Pops in there too, so Mr. Bassman became just a nightclub. Also, the song that Kermit, Phyllis and Fozzie have to play to get in was originally supposed to be "Together Again" from _Muppets Take Manhattan_, but I realized that (at that point) I might not have a chance to incorporate music from anything besides _Muppets Take Manhattan_ and _The Muppet Show_, so I changed it—and now with the help of "The Magic Store", songs from _The Muppet Movie_ dominate the "movie" half of the music. As well, "Mr. Bassman: For Unemployed Musicians" was originally "Emmett Otter's Home for Out of Work Musicians". (I personally think it's all _much_ better the way it turned out.)

"_**Broken Heart, Right?"**_

When Rowlf tries to cheer Phyllis up after Kermit meets Miss Piggy, he was originally going to sing "New Love Song", a song I liked from _The Muppet Show_. But I realized that I didn't have the lyrics to "New Love Song", and also (in accordance with my attempt to make all the songs match up to their original performers) Rowlf only played the piano in that song, he didn't sing. Then I saw _The Muppet Movie_ again, decided to change the song, and I burned a copy of "I Hope that Somethin' Better Comes Along" onto a CD and copied over the lyrics. _Then_ I realized how similar the two scenes (fanfic and movie) were.

_**Scooter**_

First, "Shoeshine Scooter" was supposed to have just a throwaway bit part and only be mentioned in passing. Then I read ReneeLouvier's fanfiction "The Search for Sadie" (present on this site and one of my FAVORITE stories EVER), and the story distressed me enough that I vowed that Scooter would have the _biggest_ bit part I could write for him. I was obsessing over Scooter for a while there, worrying about him and always trying to spot him in the crowd during scenes in _The Muppet Show_, but then I saw _The Muppets Wizard of Oz_, and with my relief as seeing him "active" again the chemicals in my brain reverted back to normal and...his bit part is _still_ a bit part. Oh yeah, and originally when Phyllis went to Shoeshine Scooter's to try to find out about the location of El Sleezo, Scooter was supposed to sing his lines in the song "Happiness Hotel", then Rizzo was supposed to sing _his_ part (which came immediately after Scooter's), and that was how they were going to find Rizzo. But then I realized that they were _already_ at Scooter's for a bit too long, so that got cut.

_**STATLER AND WALDORF**_

I had had trouble for a while about including the thing with Statler and Waldorf being the "ultimate villains"—first I'd laugh my head off and go "YEAAHHH!!" and then I'd think "No wait that's the STUPIDEST thing I've ever heard!!"...but I kept it, and here probably BOTH of those statements are right.

———

All righty, that's the last of the special features. So, in the very _touching_, heart-wrenching, mind-bogglingly-sentimental words of Animal:

"GO HOME! GO HOME! BYE BYE..."

HAVE A VERY MUPPETS INSERT YOUR CHOICE OF CONVENIENTLY NEARBY HOLIDAY HERE!!


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